Security agencies, including the police, military, and intelligence services, have consistently been the worst enemies of the media in Nigeria in recent years and were responsible for the highest number of attacks against journalists in 2024, according to an annual state of media freedom report for the year released today by Media Rights Agenda (MRA).
MRA noted in the 137-page report titled “Media Freedom Under Threat: The State of Media Freedom and Journalists’ Safety in Nigeria 2024” that out of a total of 64 attacks against journalists that it recorded in 2022, law enforcement and security agencies were responsible for 29 of them, representing approximately 45 per cent of the attacks; while they were responsible for 34 out of the 77 attacks against journalists it documented in 2023, representing approximately 44 per cent.
However, MRA said, the situation got significantly worse in 2024 as law enforcement and security agencies were responsible for 45 out of the total number of 69 attacks against journalists documented by MRA between January 1 and October 31, 2024, representing approximately 65 percent.
In a statement issued in Lagos announcing the launch of the report, MRA’s Programme Officer, Mr. John Gbadamosi, said: “It is ironic that the institutions tasked with upholding the rule of law as well as ensuring the safety and security of citizens, including journalists, have instead become the instruments of oppression against the media. It is worse still that the pervasive culture of impunity which has ensured a lack of accountability for past attacks has now emboldened these perpetrators to the extent that we are now seeing them at their most horrendous.”
The report documented in detail 21 cases of assault and battery against journalists during the first 10 months of the year; 17 cases of arbitrary arrests and detention; three cases of raids on homes/offices of journalists; eight cases of threat to life; two cases of harassment, six cases of abductions/kidnapping; five instances when journalists were obstructed from performing their duties; one journalist killed and six cases of other forms of attacks.
Besides law enforcement and security agencies, other perpetrators of attacks against journalists documented in the report include other government officials, responsible for four of the attacks; the courts, responsible for two violations of journalists’ rights; thugs and hoodlums, responsible for seven of the attacks; four unknown gunmen and six other unknown persons.
Mr. Gbadamosi identified a positive development in the course of the year, observing that “In recent years, crippling fines imposed by the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) on broadcast stations for alleged violations of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code has been a recurring feature in the threat landscape. But 2024 recorded zero fines imposed on broadcast stations by the NBC, apparently as a result of court judgments secured by MRA in May 2023 and January 2024 forbidding the NBC from further imposing such fines on broadcasters. We commend the NBC for complying with the courts’ orders.”
In addition, he said, the year also witnessed another positive development with the opening of a court-mandated inquiry into the death of Mr. Pelumi Onifade, a 20-year-old reporter with Gboah TV who was reportedly arrested by policemen attached to a Lagos State taskforce while he was covering the #EndSARS protests in 2020, and later found dead at a mortuary in Ikorodu in Lagos, where his body was deposited.
Describing the development as unprecedented and a significant step toward accountability and justice in cases involving attacks on journalists in Nigeria, Mr. Gbadamosi said MRA is very proud to have instituted the wrongful death suit against the Police and the Lagos State Government which resulted in the judgment of a Federal High Court in Lagos directing an investigation into the late journalist’s death.
He said: “Despite these significant positive developments in the year, the threat environment for journalism and media practice in Nigeria remains extremely concerning and urgent measures must be taken to protect journalists and hold perpetrators of attacks against them accountable. Such measures should include strengthening Nigeria’s legal framework to better protect journalists and ensure that all attacks against journalists are speedily investigated and the perpetrators prosecuted and punished.”
According to Mr. Gbadamosi, without meaningful action to safeguard media freedom in Africa’s largest democracy, the cycle of violence and other forms of attacks against journalists as well as impunity for such attacks will persist, further undermining Nigeria’s democracy and the public’s right to know.
