Arise Townhall: Tinubu vows not to give in to blackmail
The presidential candidate for the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu has criticised ARISE TV for continuously airing a commercial for its upcoming town hall meeting.
The broadcast media stated on November 25 that its presidential town hall will take place on December 4, with four contenders set to attend.
The Bola Tinubu campaign organisation stated, however, that its presidential candidate will not attend, citing a lack of prior conversation with ARISE TV as the reason for the absence.
Additionally, the campaign organisation had advised ARISE TV against utilising its candidate’s image in advertisements for the town hall meeting.
ARISE TV identified Tinubu as one of the invited candidates on a second poster promoting the town hall meeting on Tuesday, citing section 22 of the Nigerian constitution of 1999 in defence.
The television channel stated that candidates in the 2023 presidential election must abide by the constitution and reply to media inquiries regarding their manifestos.
Mr. Bayo Onanuga, Director of Media and Publicity for the APC Presidential Campaign Council, said in a statement on Saturday that it was shocking that the station continued to broadcast Tinubu’s participation despite the party’s earlier statement that the former Lagos state governor would not be available.
The statement, titled ‘Tinubu will not cave to Arise News’s blackmail,’ reads, “We find it shocking and downright bizarre that Arise News continues to broadcast the participation of All Progressives Congress Presidential Candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu in its Presidential Town Hall meeting scheduled to take place on December 4, 2022, despite our earlier statement that our candidate will not be available.
“We’ve seen that Arise News has also been waging a campaign on the so-called constitutional obligation of the presidential contenders to participate in its discussion by dubiously using section 22 of the Nigerian Constitution regarding the responsibility of the mass media.
“While it is common knowledge that the media has a constitutional obligation to hold public officeholders accountable to the citizens and its role as the watchdog of the society, there is nothing in the Constitution and Section 22 that requires a presidential candidate of any political party, and least of all Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, to participate in an Arise News Town Hall event or any media-organized event at all.
“The same Constitution grants all Nigerian citizens, including Asiwaju Tinubu, the freedom of association and choice.” As he seeks the mandate of Nigerians to be chosen as our country’s next president, the APC presidential candidate has the right to choose where he travels and which activities he attends.
“We wish to make it clearly clear that Asiwaju Tinubu will not participate in or attend the Arise News Town Hall meeting scheduled for Sunday, December 4, 2022, or any others that may be planned prior to the presidential election in February 2023.
“The APC presidential nominee has his own itinerary of campaign events and other commitments in Nigeria and abroad. One of these engagements is his scheduled speech on Security, Economy, and Foreign Policy at Chatham House in London on Monday, December 5, 2022.
“Asiwaju Tinubu travelled to the United Kingdom early this morning (Saturday) for this engagement. We wish to emphasise for the umpteenth time that no amount of extortion, coercion, media bullying, or insinuation from the owner and management of Arise News will sway our campaign’s position on this issue.”
