With just a week to the 2019 general elections, the Federal Government has warned politicians against promoting any comment that will cast Nigeria into a state of chaos during and after the polls.
The government equally warned journalists, the media and other Nigerians against hate speech, fake news and any other unpatriotic act that could fuel crisis.
“It is not a time in engaging or abetting the promotion of violence in return for parochial selfish ambitious’’, the Minister of Information and Cultural Orientation, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said on Saturday in Abuja at the national workshop on broadcast media coverage of the 2019 general elections, with the theme: “fake news, hate speech, vote and PVC buying”.
Alhaji Mohammed, who was represented by the Permanent Secretary in the ministry, Mrs Grace Ekpe said: “I make bold to sincerely say that Nigeria has indeed, attained some remarkable strides as a nation.’’
However, the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) has, again, cautioned journalists and media houses against spreading fake news and hate speech during the polls, at points of collation of results and after the announcement of results.
The NBC Director General Mallam Is’haq Modibbo Kawu warned journalists against doing the bidding of politicians before, during and after the conduct of elections.
“As the politicians and political parties make the spirited efforts of wooing the electorate around Nigeria, it is our duty, to help the country make a most meaningful sense of the entire political and electoral process, from the standpoint of the broadcast industry’’, Mallam Kawu said.
He said the commission would administer the most extreme forms of reprimands against any of its licensees, if that became necessary, to save the country from danger.
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