The newly sworn-in Senator Abdullahi Adamu-led National Working Committee NWC of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, has taken over the Media Centre at the party’s National Secretariat, Abuja.
The centre had housed scores of journalists right from when the party was in the opposition and even after it assumed power in 2015.
However, no fewer than 70 journalists, some of them bureau chiefs and political editors, were asked to leave the centre known as Buhari House, yesterday.
While no reason was advanced for the action, Adamu, 75, had during his acceptance speech on March 27 cautioned the media to be conscious of their reportage of the APC administration.
The former governor dedicated two of his 15-paragraph acceptance speech to caution the media.
Adamu said in the speech: “At this point, I wish to appeal to our journalists and media houses to revive and uphold the patriotic spirit of the founding fathers of their profession such as Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Malam Abubakar Imam, Alhaji Alade Odunewu and other media pioneers. Those great pioneers of Nigerian journalism always put the interests of Nigeria and its people above all other considerations and they always worked for the peace, progress and prosperity of Nigeria.
“Journalists and everyone else in Nigeria should uphold this spirit of selflessness and patriotism and continue to work hard for the success of the Nigerian project. It is not correct to assume that it is the work of political leaders alone that will make Nigeria great, that other citizens can sit on the sidelines and just observe and criticise. We should all remember the wisdom in the saying that the chain is no stronger than its weakest link.”
While asking newsmen to vacate the allocated media centre, yesterday, a party official announced that “the party leadership was embarking on a remodelling exercise, hence the need to vacate the media centre.”
However, sources at the party secretariat said the national chairman was planning to take over the media centre at the ground-floor as his office instead of the national chairman’s allocated office.
One of the sources said: “You know our new national chairman is well advanced in age and climbing the stairs up to the last floor may not be too good for him. In fact, it took him about 20 minutes to climb the staircase to the third floor this morning.
“Presently, both the staff and non-staff do not know what the ongoing reorganization at the APC secretariat will lead to. However, there are plans to install an elevator within the building but before then, the chairman deems it fit to be working everyday because the electoral timelines are very tight.
“He doesn’t want to operate from home as obtained sometime in the past. Of course, you know how that also caused serious problems for the party. So, he wants to be here with us, which is good. I believe when they eventually resume fully and get appropriate briefings, a temporary workstation would be provided for the Media.” (Vanguard)
