Being a Paper Presented May 5 2025, to Commemorate 2025 World Press Freedom Day BY
Professor Fred A. Amadi
Professor Amadi Researches Semiotics, Metacommunication and Critical Discourse Analysis.
Everything in the world, including a tiff between a wife and her husband, has its good and bad sides. As they wrangle, persons in a relationship spew inconvenient home truths that, otherwise, will not surface. When such insider home truth bursts forth, anyone who dares to debunk it sets themselves up for the guilt of “bad faith” (Kamberelis & Dimitriadis, 2013, pp. 314-315).
Journalism practice, especially the Nigerian variant, brims with inconvenient insider home truth in a measure that justifies labeling journalism in Nigeria as a mere kabuki theatre. Journalism as a kabuki theatre is a journalism of smoke and mirrors. Smoke and mirrors journalism is acclamatory. Acclamatory journalism is a “re-feudalized” journalism (Habermas, 2001, p. 200 Kunczik, 1995, p. 217).
A re-feudalized journalism exhausts itself obsessing with “facts” in ignorance of the view that the “meaning of facts is more import than the facts” (Gouldner, 1976, p.112, Zelizer, 1997, p.
414). A re-feudalized journalism runs with „press releases‟ and „communiqués‟ without giving a hoot about possible latent ambiguities and contradictions that lurk on such releases. Journalism that runs with press release and communiqué without qualms is a journalism that ignores the basics that complicate human communication. To underscore the fact that upon receiving a press release, journalists need to subject such releases to critical “symptomatic” or “alternative reading,” (O‟Shaugnessy, 2007, p.104, Gripsrud, 2002, pp. 130-132, Simpson, 1993, p.154) let us operationalize just a few of the basics that complicate human communication.
To be first noted here in our operationalization effort is the view that (i) “no one absolutely knows what s/he says” (O‟Hollaran, 2017, p.302, Hammersely, 2023, p.63), (2) „there is constant attempt by newsmakers to manipulate journalists and their audience” Fairclough, 2001, p.71). (3) “speakers, writers and newsmakers are hardly aware of the implication of their words, actions/inactions” (Gripsrud, 2002, p.142). (4) “…concealed or latent meanings,” hidden under overt meanings “are most significant” in communication (McQuail, 2010, p. 361)
When contemporary journalism is portrayed as a mere kabuki theatre as done the preceding paragraphs, such description should fray no nerves because such a portrayal only echoes inconvenient home truth that journalists themselves tell about journalism. Many journalists describe themselves as “misfits and failures” (Beck, Benut & Well, 2004, P. 320). Gunther Walraff, a journalist himself, had in a 1977 paper described professional journalists as “cynics, low-lifers whose social standing is as low as the alcoholic content of their blood is high” (Kunczik, 1995, p. 40). Here in Nigeria, our own Olatunji Ololade, an award-winning journalist with The Nation newspaper spurts “Nigerian journalists remain, among others, emissaries of distrust, rancour and pitiful pawns in the designs of god-fathers” (Ololade, 2011, p. 23).
If you think the foregoing asperity on journalism is underserved, then think about the following blood-curdling instances of “structural amnesia” and “snippet journalism” (Kunczik, 1995, pp. 161 & 149) with regard to how Nigeria‟s newspapers report the jiggery-pokery between Dangote Refinery and Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited –NNPCL.
Questionable Reportage Exemplars
Punch 8/9/2024: NNPCL Conditions: Dangote refinery may dump local market, export petrol p.3
Olufemi Soneye (1) NNPCL would only fully off take petrol from the refinery if the market prices were higher than the pump prices in Nigeria.
NNPC Spokesman
(2) Dangote Refinery and any other domestic refinery are free to sell directly
to any other marketer on willing-buyer and willing-seller basis.
(3) On pricing, I can‟t say anything because we don‟t control the pricing. It is controlled by NNPCL.
Aliko Dangote
(4) There has been a blockade for lifting our product within the country. So, now we have been exporting.
Punch 15/9/2024: Marketers eye direct deal with Dangote as NNPCL buys N766/Litre: Page 3
Wale Edun, Minister (1) Wale Edum noted that interested marketers would have to buy the product from NNPCL.
of Economy PMS will only be sold to NNPCL. NNPCL will then sell to various
(2) marketers.
Billy Gillis Harry (3) We are about to leave NNPCL monopoly from importation and now we are also going to have that in a domestic environment.
Guardian 6/7/2024: Local refineries: Why crisis over crude supply will persist p. 2
Kingsley Jeremiah In this deal with Afrexim bank, NNPC would pay a total of 164.25 million barrels of crude oil which is worth $14.6bn for a loan of $3.3bn
This Day 6/7/2024: Oil refiners back senate’s probe of dirty fuel import, want end to unfair Trade –by Emmanuel Addeh P.6
Ekpenyong Senator Asuquo Ekpanyong argued that the quality of the diesel was below the Nigerian standard in terms of sulphur levels. Yet despite the sub-standard nature of the diesel, it still found its way into the Nigeria market.
Analysis
A brand of journalism that is not of smoke and mirrors would have sought, upon hearing
Olufemi Sonoye‟s comments above, further clarification by asking if he was unaware that comment (1) might be interpreted to mean that NNPCL does not want Nigerians to enjoy a cheaper pump price of fuel. If Nigeria‟s journalism is not suffering of smoke and mirrors, the
Punch of 8/9/2024, p. 3 would also have demanded that Olufemi Sonoye should defend the
verity of his comment number two(2) against Aliko Dangote;s comments three (3) and four(4). If Nigeria‟s journalists and Punch are in the habit of pointing out news-making shenanigans like the ones under focus, then, Nigeria‟s journalism would have been applauded for being exceptionally excellent in letting the powerful understand that talk/comments should not be cheapened. A cheapened talk instantiated when Punch of 15/9/2024 on page 3 failed to engage Wale Edun, the Minister of Economy, to clarify his comments (1) and (2) in the light of Billy Gillis Harry‟s misgivings.
In the case of the „facts‟ contained in the Guardian of 6/7/2024, p. 2, the reporter needed to seek further clarification on behalf of Nigerian economists and other informed members of the audience who may find it hard to stomach a loan deal on a term where $14.6bn would be paid for borrowing $3,3bn. A more intriguing question that the Guardian reporter failed Nigerians by not asking is why, for the first time in Nigeria, more so in a time that a huge private refinery is operational in Nigeria, a whopping 164.25 million barrels of Nigeria‟s crude oil were used as collateral for an obvious harsh loan deal. A journalism brand that is free from smoke and mirrors would have gone the extra mile of unraveling for Nigerians, the share holders/owners of the bank that insisted on such a shylock loan condition. The report of This Day newspaper of 6/7/2024, p. 6 was also vacuous for failing to take up the concern raised by Senator Asuquo Ekeyoung with NNPCL –the sole importer of petroleum product into Nigeria as at the time of the report.
Notwithstanding the foregoing, the aloofness and reticence of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ) and the Nigerian Guild of Editors when actions like the banning by National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) of Eedris Abdulkareem‟s „Tell Your Papa‟ raise legitimate concern. Such concern is also aroused by connivance at “A Bill for an Act to Amend the Nigeria Data Protection Act, 2023 to Mandate the Establishment of Physical Offices within the Territorial Boundaries of the Federal Republic of Nigeria by Social Media Platforms for Related Matters (SB.648)” (Tsan, 2025, Pp. 1 & 28).
More worrisome is Nigeria Guild of Editors (NGE) and the Nigerian Union of Journalists‟ aloofness to the galaxy of arrests meted to journalists and other freedom of speech activists who have been under sustained harassment in the guise of the amended “Cybercrime (Prohibition Prevention) Act, 2025” (Ayeni, 2025, p.22).
The amendment of that act has lionized it into becoming an omnibus Frankenstein used in Nigeria by the executive to muzzle a gaggle of reporters, writers and activists. Based on Ayeni‟s (2025) report, critical communication stakeholders in Nigeria cannot help but would want to know what the NUJ and the NGE did, as would be expected, when Olumide Thomas, a nurse, was allegedly brutalized by state actors for speaking. Not less disturbing is the reticence of stake holders over the fate of Daniel Ojukwu of the Foundation for Investigative Journalism who was detained, May first 2024, for investigating alleged funds abuse by an official at the Presidency (Ayeni, 2025, p.22).
In a similar vein, Ayeni had also reported about the Editor of FirstNews, Segun Olatunji, who was allegedly blindfolded and flown to Abuja for detention on charges regarding his story on accountability. On February 5, 2024, the Editor-In-Chief and Managing Editor of Informant 247, Salihu Ayatulahi and Adisa-Jaji Azeez were allegedly arrested for cyber stalking because of a story on lack of transparency in the finances of Kwara State Polytechnic (Ayeni, 2025, p.22). In October 2023, Miempoma Onitsha, the founder of Naija Live TV was also arrested and charged with cybercrime. In 2022 the founder of Taraba Truth & Facts newspaper, Ayodele Oloye was arraigned for allegedly inciting the public against the governor for reporting about non-payment of teachers for 14 months. More activists, including Omoyale Sowore has been arrested for similar charges (Ayeni, 2025, p.22). Strange enough, it is improbable that these harassments were tabled when the Nigeria Guild of Editors, one organization in Nigeria with commensurate clout to contest these abuses, held their 2024 annual meeting.
If reticence and aloofness of this kind is how to heed the call urging NUJ “to continue exploring opportunities for media and journalism survival” (Vanguard, Comment 2025, P. 18), then such attention is antithetical to the advice that “the Nigerian Union of Journalist NUJ and the Nigerian Guild of Editors NGE must immediately depart from mundane Unionism and offer robust leadership to their members to enable both bodies take on any authority that deprives the media from carrying out the assignment given to it by the constitution” (Iredia, 2022, p.18).
Perhaps, the strong belief in many quarters that Nigeria‟s media do not only act the antithesis of what is expected of them but only wallow in journalistic smoke and mirrors might be touted as provoking views such as “The media award in Nigeria tell a pathetic national story. The watchdog has insidiously metamorphosed into a lapdog. All crooked politicians in the country have tens of those „supposedly prestigious‟ award‟ (Egbujo, 2025, P. 24). What Egbujo has decried is the strange behavior in Nigeria‟s journalism where media awards are consistently given to the politicians whose habit remains acting as the nemesis of free speech –talk of victims endorsing their own victimization!
Journalism as a Work in Progress
Given that there is no country with a perfect press –not even in the United States where all the media are biased towards the Democratic Party except Fox News that bends towards the Republicans –the American journalism model is still the best. For ensuring that the powerful, from the President to the Senate leader, the House Speaker, the Press Secretary and so forth are buttonholed by the press to account for their stewardship on daily basis, the American model remains the way to go (Watters, 2025). In that model, a President who claims to have embarked on a working visit is, for instance, welcomed at the airport, not by fawning party apparatchiks, but a gaggle of smart reporters who broadcast, live and unedited, episodes of epistemic questionand-answer sessions between reporters and the president, or the House Speaker, or the Senate Leader and so forth on all communication media platforms. If the media in Nigeria is desirous of rebooting to acquire the much-needed reportorial oomph in order to free itself from hokum and captivity (Utomi, 2025), this is the time to copy the best that the American journalism model offers.
References
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