By Tola Adeniyi

“In stark contrast is the positive coverage given to Israel and India, countries vital for American strategic interests in the Middle East and South Asia. Their gross and consistent

violations of human rights, proliferation of nuclear weapons and illegal occupation of territory has all been covered up while they are praised as “shining examples of democracy”.

And during the better-forgotten COVID-19 scare the Canadian government allegedly spent $88.7 million on communications and marketing related to COVID-19. UK was reputed to be the biggest advertiser of brain-washing misinformation. According to The Washington Post, Biden administration allegedly spent entire corporate media $1 billion as part of huge campaign to push only positive coverage and $250 million on a marketing blitz to build trust in the Corona virus vaccines safety!

Now, back to Nigeria, a country in the throes of death. For about 23 years since it was fed with pretensions of democracy, Nigeria has been kept under lock and key by ‘misrulers’ who like to deceive themselves that they were/are practicing democracy where the mandatory doctrine of separation of powers exists. Pshaw!

“There was no pretence in the first eight-years of the experiment of democratic rule. It was merely the darning of agbada over starched Khaki and jackboots. It was almost a full-blown military dictatorship where towns and communities were sacked by the command of the President without resort to the Legislature or the Judiciary. It was the Nigeria Media that exposed the Ghana-Must-Go bags stuffed with Dollars for the purchase of a notorious 3rd Term. It was the Nigeria Media that put paid to one man’s ambition to keep Nigeria under his armpit ‘for life!’

The Legislature and the Judiciary went to sleep when another President was gasping for life in faraway Saudi Arabia or God knows where. The Media was the only Estate standing. But for the Media, the Dead like the Shrouded Spirit of the Yoruba Egungun pantheon would have been left to rule Nigeria ad infinitum.

It was the Nigeria Media that rescued Nigeria from the jaws of the Naira-Chewing Predators under the cover of huge Umbrella which ravaged the country for four and half good years under the blindfolded watch of the Legislature and the Judiciary. Regrettably though, and here was a huge minus, the Nigeria Media colluded with conmen and conwomen to impose ‘a See Nothing, Hear Nothing and Say Nothing Absolute Ruler with draconian decrees on the country, as an alternative.

Nigerians must thank God that the Media, immediately thereafter, woke up from their slumber and recovered their senses and have since resumed their watch-dog role in the face of the absentee Executive, absentee legislature [recently chased out of Abuja by imported terrorists] and absentee Judiciary [until recently headed by Sharia-bag carrying Messenger of the gods]. I didn’t say Vulture.

In the last eight years there have been a relentless war on the Nigerian economy, on Nigerian security, on Nigerian education and on Nigerian ancestral lands and Waters by a single individual who had commandeered the three Estates of the Realm and collapsed them under his boots.

Never in the chequered history of Nigeria has there been one man who bestrode the landscape of the country with absolute disregard, scorn and arrogant condescension as we have currently witnessed. Never in the history of Nigeria has there been a Ruler who was hardly seen by even his own appointed Ministers! A country where the Ruler did not know and could not recognize faces of some of his own Cabinet members.

But for the Media we would not have known that the Ruler while on a visit to Cairo, invited terrorists all over Africa to descend on Nigeria and proclaim the hapless country their own. It was the Media that allowed us to know that the Ruler harboured internationally acclaimed terrorists in his Cabinet.

It was the Nigeria Media, the last Estate Standing, which made it possible for Nigerians and the entire world to be aware of the systemic pogrom and ethnic cleansing which almost virtually swallowed up the entire country. It is gratifying that regardless of the shenanigans of the Enablers of Terrorism, the whole world through various Embassies, High Commissions, International Agencies and sundry Representatives as well as foreign media correspondents domiciled in Nigeria were able to have enough dossier that would be used in the fullness of time.

It is the Nigeria Media, which made Nigerians to know that there are rats, rodents and snakes that feed on billions of Naira and Dollars in Buhari’s Nigeria. There is no criminality committed by governments, which has not been exposed by the Media. Nigerians everywhere in the country are aware of everything going on and they may appear seemingly helpless, but they are very conscious and prayerful for the imminent implosion.

If not for the courage, steadfastness, investigative skills and relentlessness of the Nigeria Media, those who set out to ruin the country and hand over the ancestral lands to their kith and kin would have succeeded in their insidious agenda of mass annihilation.

This writer has written copiously about Nigeria’s Parliament of Eunuchs, Chicken-hearted governors, and Politicians who really are avowed enemies of the people, it may therefore no longer be necessary to belabour issues we have been lamenting since 1971 with ‘The Overthrow of the Middleclass’ published in Sam Amuka’s Sunday Times or the ‘The National Question’ in an address to the Press at Iyaganku, Ibadan in 1982.

It is however hoped that Nigerian readers, listeners and viewers would soon realise the huge difference between trained, educated and professional media practitioners and the hacks that have now populated and polluted the otherwise hallowed media space… Nigeria Media; I salute you! You deserve medals as the only Estate standing. Concluded

Adeniyi, a renowned journalist and former Chairman/Managing Director of the defunct Daily Times, delivered this as

Keynote Address at the 3rd Origo international Awards. Lagos June 25, 2023.