Sahara Reporters with their fearless brand of journalism was the darling of the opposition during the Goodluck Jonathan administration.
For instance here are some articles published by the New York based medium for then opposition figure Dino Melaye who is now a leading ruling party figure, staunch Saraki ally and will probably do anything to abide in Baba Bubu’s good books until death or political miscalculation do them part.
http://saharareporters.com/2012/02/08/my-state-governor-corrupt-dino-melaye
http://saharareporters.com/2012/01/02/video-protesters-led-dino-melaye-confront-police-during-occupy-abuja-protest
In some of these reports, Mr. Melaye is guilty of some of the same actions he and his colleagues are seeking to restrict. For instance he called the former governor of Kogi corrupt, he also called the Jonathan administration corrupt. All of these without any real evidence, neither did he swear any affidavit before any court before accusing some of these officials of embezzling over N500 billion.
However Mr. Melaye has a deep grievance against social media users, for instance he has personally been exposed on social media by his former wives for domestic abuse.
See those stories here:
http://www.nairaland.com/1557495/dino-melayes-wife-files-divorce
http://dailypost.ng/2014/07/02/domestic-violence-dino-melayes-new-wife-packs/
https://www.naij.com/54639.html
http://abusidiqu.com/dino-melaye-wife-beating-saga-alero-melaye-opens-up/
So it is in the interest of people like Mr. Melaye to be able to scare journalists, bloggers and other social media users away from stories that may leave them open to severe penalties from an ambiguous social media law that seeks to protect those who would rather act in impunity of the law, instead of letting them be shamed in the public forum.
It’s a sad day in Nigeria when men like Mr. Melaye are able to package themselves under the disguise and ambiguity of change and present themselves to Nigerians as sheep only to emerge wolves once they have usurped the instrument of power.
Furthermore we are faced with a situation where only days after Sahara Reporters called the President of the Federal Government of Nigeria, a junketer in chief, it seems the political elite have begun to wage a war against the Nigerian public, and media like Sahara Reporters.
Sadly it is the story of the dehumanization of our people. Only the rulers want to have their views expressed, digested and learned. They do not want the views of others, especially the views of the majority which is in effect, the mind of God to be laid bare.
Why? Because it exposes their greed, their weakness, their ineptness, their lack of common sense, their lack of good conscience, how much money they left lying around in a hotel room (#GA), how many runs girls they slept with, the activities of the cabal, how they are clamping down on their opponents? etc etc etc
However it is foolhardy for the political elite to think they are not opening Pandora’s Box and tossing the hornet’s nest into the mix, when they do this. Some of the people they are seeking to clamp down on are the same geniuses that won them the election and represent some of the brightest and best young minds in public relations, corporate communications, creative thinking, investigative journalism, parody, comedy and all other form of human endeavour you can imagine. A direct assault on this crowd and perhaps the change mantra will realize that they have committed suicide.
Or perhaps that’s the change we get, and we will be forced to stay silent on social media until 2019 when we are presented with yet another opportunity to make the same mistakes over and over again.