The Nigerian Broadcasting Commission (NBC) has once again imposed a heavy‑handed fine on Channels TV, this time following a petition filed by an aide of President Bola Tinubu. The petition was triggered by a comment made during a live interview by Labour Party vice‑presidential candidate Datti Baba‑Ahmed, who warned that swearing Tinubu into office in May would “end” democracy in Nigeria. This manipulation of a state agency by the incoming president’s aides reveals a pattern of power abuse that is likely to worsen.
Baba‑Ahmed was mistaken in assuming that the inauguration of a president elected in a flawed process would spell the death of Nigeria’s democracy. Democracy will not die from a single inauguration; it will be suffocated by self‑appointed executioners who claim statesmanship while using democratic instruments to undermine democracy itself. The obsessive focus on the Labour Party’s presidential candidate and his supporters after the election shows that the declared winners are unsettled. The persistent presence of “Obi‑dients” delays, and therefore denies, the legitimacy of the APC, leaving the victors unable to enjoy their win and preoccupied with neutralising their opponents rather than planning for governance. This preoccupation threatens to break many things, chief among them democracy, especially when agencies like the NBC, which lack true autonomy, indulge such behaviour.
The NBC’s media‑arbitrating activities increasingly reflect partisan calculations that serve personal interests rather than principled standards for a democratic press. In earlier eras, when the government controlled the media and the military ruled the country, the NBC’s code made sense because a narrow media landscape allowed for societal manipulation. Today, however, media options are endless and audiences fragmented; no single outlet can claim primary influence over public opinion. Agenda‑setting is contested, and communication no longer occurs solely between broadcasters and passive home‑bound viewers. Despite this transformation, the NBC continues to micromanage content—even for private enterprises—handing out fines based on vague notions of what threatens the polity. Their officials still invoke outdated concepts of “objectivity,” echoing textbooks written by long‑dead theorists, and they lack the willingness to rethink their role for the 21st century. Consequently, serial petitioners like Bayo Onanuga can exploit the NBC to run partisan errands, knowing the agency will comply without moral reflexivity, thereby hastening the demise of democracy more than any politician’s live‑TV remark.
Nigerian politicians mistakenly believe that media regulation can ensure social tranquility, assuming that impoverished citizens will only turn violent if provoked by the media. This view is delusional. Media do not dictate how people think; rather, individuals with pre‑existing grievances gravitate toward outlets that affirm their views. If media wield such power, why has the NTA, which seeks to pacify impulses, failed to align public opinion? Few even watch the NTA, and the loudest complaints about stations like Arise TV reveal little about actual viewership patterns. Media houses targeted by power‑hungry officials in the coming months should resist groveling. While the press claims to inform and enlighten, it remains a business that deserves the freedom to operate without frivolous fines from clueless civil servants. One pragmatic, though cynical, solution would be to pre‑pay the NBC’s annual DG salary before airing controversial guests; another, more principled route is to challenge the NBC code in court. Its open‑ended nature leaves the media vulnerable to bad‑faith actors who shrink public discourse or deflect from their own shortcomings.
Do not allow these myrmidons of darkness to diminish your freedom. Evil is implacable, but triumph comes from shining light on truth. It is striking that Onanuga, once celebrated for resisting military press clampdowns, now mirrors the same tyrannical tactics under a democratic government. He could have offered Channels TV a chance to rebut Baba‑Ahmed’s arguments, yet he chose to act as a tyrant. This raises questions about whether past activists defended human freedom out of principle or a desire for power, and whether military regimes targeted them as genuine threats or as pretenders. On days like this, one can imagine an old dictator watching from a hilltop mansion in Minna as democratic tyrants don his former jackboots, laughing at the uncanny repetition of history’s tragedy and farce.
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