‘You’ll Be Punished If You Insult President, Govs, Others’ … As NBC Fines Nigeria Info N5m Over Mailafia’s Outburst

The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), yesterday, said it would commence punishment for any broadcast station that violates any of its code.
It warned that all broadcast stations should be guided by the ethics and code of the profession.
Citing the provisions of the Broadcasting Code: Section 3.1.: Professional Rules: 3.1.1: which states that, “No broadcast shall encourage or incite to crime, lead to public disorder or hate, be repugnant to public feelings or contain an offensive reference to any person or organization, alive or dead or generally be disrespectful to human dignity. And code: 3.1.19: The broadcast shall not transmit content that denigrates the social norms, values and culture of the society”, the Zonal Director of the NBC, Lagos Office, Chibuike Ogwumike, in his letter to newsmen, seized the opportunity to warn against messages that ‘insult’ Nigerian leaders.
He said, “Monitoring activities indicate that in the recent time, some broadcast stations have abdicated their editorial responsibilities such that guests and callers on programmes abuse and insult leaders and those in authority freely and without caution.
“To denigrate our elders and leaders in abusive terms is not our culture. We respect our leaders as a positive cultural value.
“We expect broadcasters, especially anchors to show professionalism in the handling of programmes such that guest or callers that exhibit such tendency are professionally handled.
“The recourse to abusing, denigrating and insulting the President, Governors, MPs and other leaders does not show us as cultured people.”
Meanwhile, the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) has fined a radio station, Nigeria Info, N5million, for a recent comment made by a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Dr Obadiah Mailaifa.
This was contained in a statement signed by the NBC management, yesterday titled, “The National Broadcasting Commission Fines Nigeria Info 99.3 for Unprofessional Broadcast”.
It would be recalled that the commission had recently unveiled its Reviewed Broadcasting Code in Lagos and raised the fine for hate speech from N500,000 to N5million.
Mailaifa was interviewed on Monday during one of the station’s programmes, ‘Morning Cross Fire’.
He had talked on the killings in Southern Kaduna, one of the parts of the North-West region worst hit by banditry.