The Tide Man Emerges Abia NUJ Scribe

The Abia State council of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) has conducted a bye-election to fill vacant positions in its executive with The Tide correspondent, Boniface Okoro, emerging as the new state secretary.

The council at its monthly congress last Thursday, also inaugurated a 6-member committee charged with the responsibility of flushing out fake journalists in the state.

Mrs Tina Ikwegbu and Mrs Adaeze Ralph Igbokwe, both of the state information chapel were returned as treasurer and Internal Auditor respectively, while Mr. Uche Arongwa was elected assistant secretary at the end of the bye-election.

Speaking after the election in which all the contestants were returned unopposed, Abia NUJ chairman, Comrade Hyacinth Okoli, expressed happiness over the smooth conduct of the election and charged the new executive members to put in their best to make the council grow to enviable heights.

Responding on behalf of others, Mrs Ikwuegbu assured that the new executive members would not let the council down.

While inaugurating the Task Force on fake journalists, vice president of the NUJ, zone C, Sir Ambrose Nwachukwu, charged the members not to compromise on their assignment.

Nwachukwu further enjoined the committee not to be deterred by the challenges that would confront it in the course of discharging it’s responsibly.

He said similar committees had been set up in other states in line with the directives from the national secretariat of the union.

“The national secretariat, the Central Working Committee and the National Executives Council of the union are worried by the phenomenon and are determined to reduce quackery in the profession to its barest minimum”, Nwachukwu said.

The chairman of the committee, Mr. Sunny Ogele, thanked the council for finding them worthy for the assignment and promised that the committee would discharge its duty creditably.

Ogele solicited the support of registered journalists in the task of stamping out quackery and unethical conduct by the journalists which, according to him, have dented  the image of  the union and the profession.

The members of the committee include Beniface Okoro (correspondents chapel), Uche Arongwa (BCA), Uzoma Isiakpu (state information) and Beatrice Okezie Ozoemelam (NAWOJ).

The well attended congress was also used by the council to thank God for last Sunday’s release of the four journalists and their driver by their abductors.

The council’s boss, who led the praise and worship session, said the council had good reasons to appreciate God for the release of the victims, after one week of captivity, given the fact that the incident happened in the state.

He said he was highly elated by their release in view of the stigma and discomfort caused to journalists in the state, where the victims were abducted on July 11, 2010 in a village near Aba.

He called on the Federal Government to fully equip the police and other security agencies to enable them fight crime, especially kidnapping, in the South east and other parts of the country where abduction had become notorious.

Prayers were offered for God’s protection over journalists in the country as well as divine intervention in  the fight against kidnapping in the South East zone.