Nigeria Content Online

The police yesterday arrested some journalists during a morning raid on a printing establishment in Uyo, Akwa Ibom.

In what some people
have described as the effort of the state government to muzzle media
establishment known to be strong critics of government ahead of today’s
state elections, policemen numbering about 12 were said to have stormed
Aswill printing press ,located along Akpan Etuk Street, in Uyo at about
12am on Monday.

Managing Editor of
Pivot Newspapers, Clifford Thomas, who was one of the persons arrested
by the police at the printing press, said the men came in fully armed
and asked to see the manager and director of the establishment.

The manager, the
director and some other staff of the press were taken away by the
police. Mr Thomas and his staff were subsequently released when no
incriminating evidence against the government was found in their
publication.

During the raid, Mr
Thomas and his men were ordered to sit on the floor, their phones and
other communication gadgets were seized. Narrating his experience to
NEXT, Mr Thomas said the leader of the police team told him that the
deputy commissioner of Police instructed them to come to the printing
press and check for anything that might be construed as an attack on
the state governor.

“The police were
quite polite; they did not beat or harass anybody, except that the
experience of being taken off your work when you were progressing at a
speed and they stopped you was very traumatic,” he said. “The leader of
the police team informed me that he was acting on instruction. He said
the deputy Commissioner of Police instructed them to come to the
printing press and check those newspapers or anything that is an attack
on Godswill Akpabio.”

Gagging the media

“To swamp on a
printing press that was merely printing newspapers show that there is
no freedom of the press and the fundamental rights of people have been
breached. I don’t think they want democracy to survive. Democracy
thrives on free press,” he said.

Editor-in-Chief of
Insight Newspapers, one of the papers printed at the raided printing
press, David Augustine, confirmed that the printing press was actually
raided and that copies of Global Concord newspaper were taken away. He
however said his newspapers were not seized by the police.

“The target of the
raid was not myself or my paper,” he said, adding that he could not
ascertain the motive behind the raid as he was not there.

When the Police Public Relations Officer, Onyekaozuru Orji was contacted on the issue, he feigned ignorance.