President-elect Muhammadu Buhari has denied
barring African Independent Television (AIT) from
covering his activities and said he only became
aware of the matter after the public uproar it
generated. AIT had been barred from covering his
activities on Monday, but the APC overturned the
decision the following day. Buhari says he was
neither consulted nor informed about the AIT
barring.
And in a statement released on Wednesday
evening by Garba Shehu, the head of the media and
publicity directorate of the APC presidential
campaign, Buhari was quoted as saying: “The time
of change has come and we must avoid making
the same mistakes that the outgoing government
made.”Shehu’s statement said Buhari has
instructed all his staff, including the personnel
attached directly to him, “to steer clear of all
dealings with the media, and leave all media affairs
to his official media team”. Adding that his media
team should be left to deal with their media
colleagues as they best knew how.“I would like
everyone to henceforth stay within his/her defined
area of responsibility.”
On Monday, Shehu had said AIT has been asked
to step aside based on security and family
concerns. In addition, that Buhari has decided that
they will have to resolve some issues relating to
issues of standard and ethics.“We will be talking
with them to try and resolve the matter, but for
now the station has been asked to stay aside
because, like I said, there are some family and
security concerns. They have been asked to step
down their coverage until we resolve the matter
with them on ethics and standards. You can quote
me that I said that we have asked them to step
aside and that we are resolving the the issues of
ethics and standards with them.”