Wike's aide clarifies comment on Okinbaloye
Lere Olayinka, Senior Special Assistant on Public Communications and Social Media to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has clarified one of the comments made by
- From Gbenga Omokhunu, Abuja
Lere Olayinka, Senior Special Assistant on Public Communications and Social Media to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has clarified one of the comments made by the Minister during Friday's Media Chat, on Channels Television's Seun Okinbaloye, saying he only spoke figuratively.
Olayinka, in a statement on Saturday, said, "The Minister never meant that he would shoot Seun Okinbaloye. They even spoke on the phone today, and he (Okinbaloye) understood what the minister meant.
"What the minister meant, which he made clear during the media chat, was that he was angry seeing Okinbaloye, whom he holds in high esteem as a journalist, descending into the political arena by speaking as an interested party, instead of an interviewer.
"The statement made by the Minister was in a hyperbolic context, which was clearly without intent. It was primarily using exaggeration to make a point.
"Even after the Minister made the clarifications on the live television programme, which had Chamberlain Uzor, Head of Channels Television's Abuja Office as part of the interviewers, all the journalists who were interviewing him just laughed.
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"Therefore, after the Minister detailed explanations of what he meant, including saying on the live television programme that he didn't mean that he would carry a gun and shoot the television anchor, it will become a clear hatchet job for any individual or group to pick the statement out of context and make any issue out of it.
"The public is therefore urged to discountenance the use of the comment as an instrument of blackmail and propaganda by those whose intent is to misrepresent facts for their political gains," he said.
The statement generated reactions in different quarters, with Amnesty International (AI) and a coalition of civil society organisations describing the minister's comment as a “violent” remark directed at Channels Television anchor, Seun Okinbaloye.
The controversy stemmed from a statement made by Okinbaloye during a live broadcast of 'Politics Today', a Channels Television current affairs programme, on Thursday, where he warned about perceived threats to Nigeria's multi-party democracy.
Okinbaloye had said: “I am particularly pained because when one party stands in the middle of a ballot, we are looking for the rest of the political parties. When some of us talk, it looks like our mouths are smelling. And we have been on this ground for a while,” Okinbaloye said.
“There are a lot of experienced men in the ADC who should have seen the devil in some of the issues that have been raised in the past months. Particularly, it looks like one of the hopes of the opposition going into 2027. If this hope is dashed, we are doomed democratically.”
His remarks were made against the backdrop of the controversy surrounding the derecognition of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) leadership by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
But, reacting passively during his monthly media chat on Friday, Minister Wike expressed anger at the TV journalist's comments, stating, “I was thoroughly surprised yesterday when I was watching Seun's Politics Today. If there was any way to break the screen, I would have shot him. How can an interviewer say we cannot allow a one-party state?
“You are now telling them your own view, as an interviewer, that you can't allow a one-party state. I was just taken aback. I am not saying I will kill him. I am just angered that he made that kind of statement on national television. This is not the kind of journalism I have seen people do.”
