The management of First News, an online newspaper, has retracted a story of a purported $30 billion fraud story allegedly involving President Bola Tinubu’s Chief of Staff, Femi Gbajabiamila.
The newspaper published a retraction of the story with apology on its website on Wednesday.
The controversial news story, authored by the newspaper’s editor, Segun Olatunji,was published on 29 January.
It was published with the title, ‘How Gbajabiamila attempted to corner $30bn, 66 houses traced to Sabiu’.
But retracting the article on Wednesday, the First News management admitted that it found out that the publication about Mr Gbajabiamila contained “falsehoods and fabricated stories handed out to us as facts by a misleading source which was highly negligent on our part and for which we deeply tender an unreserved apology to the Chief of Staff to the President.”
The media outlet further said it has no malicious intent towards Mr Gbajabiamila
“Hence, our decision to tender an unreserved apology and the need to publish a retraction of the said story,” it added.
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Gbajabiamila’s threat to sue
First News’ apology came days after Mr Gbajabiamila’s lawyer, Kemi Pinheiro, wrote the outlet demanding apology over the defamatory publication against his client.
In the letter dated 3 May and addressed to Mr Olatunji, Mr Pinheiro, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), demanded First News apologises within seven days of the receipt of the letter. The letter of demand for retraction was published by the law firm in the 7 May (Tuesday) publication of ThisDay newspaper.
The lawyer added that the retraction must be published in two Nigerian dailies, and the apology letter circulated on the same media platforms on which the disputed article was published.
Mr Pinheiro threatened that should First News fail to comply with his client’s demands, a defamation suit would be instituted against the newspaper.
Background
As a fallout of the defamatory article against Mr Gbajabiamila, Mr Olatunji said he was seized from his home in Lagos on 15 March and flown to Abuja by the Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA).
Mr Olatunji was detained for 14 days. He was only released following persistent demands by the International Press Institute (IPI), the Nigerian Guild of Editors, the Nigeria Union of Journalists and other civil society groups.
His arrest and manhandling drew outrage within the human rights community in Nigeria.
In the defamatory article, Mr Gbajabiamila was portrayed as re-looting funds and landed properties allegedly recovered from Tunde Sabiu, an aide and relative to former President Muhammadu Buhari.
First News says it has now determined that the claims about the Chief of Staff were fabricated.
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