****Seek redress appropriately, Journalists are not your problem.
By Friday Idachaba, Lokoja.
Kogi State Council of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) has advised politicians to exploit prescribed channels of seeking redress whenever the outcome of elections were not favourable to them rather than resorting to blackmail and pointing accusing fingers at journalists.
Comrade Adeiza Momoh-Jimoh, Chairman of the state council of NUJ gave the advice at a press conference which he titled, “Don’t Drag Us Into Your Mucky Political Waters”, on Sunday at the NUJ Press Centre, Lokoja.
Momoh-Jimoh said the attention of the Union had been drawn to some reports in the media by politicians following the conduct of APC govermorship primary in the state.
He said that the politicians tried to condemn the exercise and in a way, impugning on the integrity of journalists and their various media organisations.
The politicians, he said, had claimed that elections were not held anywhere and that the results were cooked and announced for the journalists to report and published.
“Audio, videos and pictorials evidence of the exercise were gotten from the field by journalists while monitoring the process and reports were sent to various media houses, based on their observations on the field.
“Our members were fair enough to report places where voting started early and some other places where there were delays in arrival of electoral materials and officials as is typical of Nigerian elections”, he said.
The chairman averred that the journalists having monitored and reported the process in their earlier reports, converged at the collation center at the State APC secretariat in Lokoja for their final results
The Journalists, he said, stayed up till 3am in in the wee hours of the morning of Saturday to also cover the collation and declaration of results.
“For any aggrieved politician to now assert that all these sacrifices done by journalists amounted to colluding to declare concocted results, is not just far from the truth but showing disrespect for journalists and their media organizations.
“For us at the Kogi NUJ, we stand by the reports of journalists as published in their various media outlets on the conduct of the election.
“We want to use this medium to advise our politicians to use the prescribed ways of seeking redress whenever the outcome of elections are not favourable to them rather than resorting to blackmail and attempting to pull everything down”, he advised.
Momoh-Jimoh however, urged media professionals operating in the state to continue to uphold the ethical standards of the profession throughout the election season and beyond.
To the aspirants who lost at the primaries, he said, “Let them know that journalists are not and will never be their problems as they go in search of solution to their problems.” (Ends)