Expulsion Of Reporter, Manifestation Of Full-Blown Dictatorship – PDP

Abuja – The opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Tuesday faulted the presidency over the expulsion of Olalekan Odetayo, a reporter with Punch newspapers over a story he wrote on the ill-health of President Muhammadu Buhari.
The party in giving support to the reporter also demanded a full disclosure of the health conditions of the president who has rarely been seen in public since his return to the country after a medical trip to the United Kingdom.
The PDP in a statement by the spokesman of the party’s caretaker committee, Prince Dayo Adeyeye said the action of Abubakar Bashir, the chief security officer (CSO) to the president in unilaterally expelling the reporter is a manifestation of full blown dictatorship in the country under the government of All Progressives Congress (APC).
Odetayo ran into trouble waters with Bashir following a story titled “Fresh anxiety at the Aso Rock Presidential Villa over Buhari’s health.”
Though it was reported yesterday that Odetayo has been recalled following the intervention of Femi Adesina,  the president’s spokesman, however, said emphatically on Monday that he was not consulted before the CSO took the decision to expel the reporter.
The opposition party said it acknowledged the fact that the president is fragile because of old age, and has literally been bogged down by the weight of the demands of the office of the president, stressing that the story by the reporter should not have elicited such harsh reaction from the presidency.
The party noted that it’s wrong for the government to make attempts at gagging the press which will spell doom for the nation’s democracy.

POSTED BY:OPUOMONI PRIYE
DATE:04/26/2017