“A person who carries a load shame hardly gets anybody to help him put it down” — Wise Saying
The seemingly unending face-off between the FCT minister, Senator Bala Mohammed and Mallam Tukur Mamu, Publisher of Kaduna-based Desert Herald magazine, came to a heady climax recently with the arrest and subsequent arraignment of the latter at the magistrate court, Zone 2, Wuse Abuja.
Though, he feigned sickness and slumped and had to be rushed to the hospital for medical attention, many inside the court suspected that Mamu who walked into the court in high spirits did what he did in a bid to curry sympathy from the judge so as to be granted bail. This, however, backfired as the discerning judge; Magistrate Tony Ubani directed that subject to his recovery, he should be produced in the court next Monday 9th September, 2013.
Though, the law presumes all accused persons innocent until proven otherwise, but considering the water-tight case against the embattled publisher, save for divine intervention, he may be on his way to jail. At least, it will serve as a deterrent to those with similar destructive mindset.
For those who might not be too conversant with the nitty-gritty of the case, I crave your indulgence to come along with me as we mount the horse and gallop down the memory lane. Tukur’s journey to the Golgotha began a few months ago (precisely April 14, 2013) when in a characteristic manner, he decided to zero in on the FCT minister for blackmail via a promo on the front page of his newspaper, Desert Herald titled: ‘’WATCH OUT! FCT ADMINISTRATION: THE ROT WITHIN‘’. In that advertorial, Mamu solicited for negative reports from members of the public to enable him complete the phantom book he claimed to be writing against the minister, even without giving the minister the opportunity of a fair hearing, a totally unprofessional conduct, I tell you.
The story did not end there. Mamu used his MTN lines (08036376131/08099138343) to send SMS to Mr. Nosike Ogbuenyi, the SA media to the minister soliciting for the payment of N15million as a condition for stopping the publication of the book. He followed it up by sending First Bank Kaduna account number 1000044292 of Desert Herald for the payment of the bribe. Several other discussions he had with Mr. Ogbuenyi were recorded on audio tape.
When all efforts, including that made by the Nigerian Union of Journalists, NUJ, via a panel to resolve the matter proved abortive because of Mamu’s intransigence, the minister proceeded to court to clear his name. It would be recalled that the NUJ panel publicly indicted, disowned and blacklisted him.
It simply beggars belief that even when the case was still pending in court, Mamu like a loose cannon, was firing from all cylinders, issuing press statements and using proxies to write derogatory articles against the minister with reckless abandon.
The disgraceful downfall of the hitherto infallible and pompous Tukur Mamu as epitomised in his arrest and subsequent arraignment before the court is a vindication for the avowed proponents of nemesis, otherwise known as the law of retributive justice. His current self-imposed travails has made bigger the question mark on the thoroughly debased role of newspaper publishing in Nigeria, the fundamental human rights of Nigerians, which those publishers recklessly try to abridge and of course, the questionable relevance of monitoring agencies of journalism practice.
It would be recalled that when recklessness landed Mamu in the hands of the police under the then IGP, Ogbonaya Onovo, after he tried desperately to extort money from Yobe State government, his home state, it was the Nigerian Union of Journalists that he ran to for succour. And the union rose up to the occasion by getting the police to promptly release him.
The pertinent questions to ask are: Now that Mamu has bitten the fingers that gave him succour in his trying moments by disparaging the Union in his current tango with the FCT minister, what next for him? Would any right-thinking person consent to stick out his neck this time around to save the ingrate who has found himself at the wrong side of the law?
The embattled publisher must be told in no uncertain terms that he cannot eat his cake and still have it; he cannot approbate and reprobate at the same time. He cannot wish for his own freedom, while working tirelessly to circumscribe the freedom of others. Like it is said in local parlance, a child that denies his mother sleep, will himself not sleep. There is also a saying in my dialect that you do not insult the crocodile until you have safely crossed over to the other side of the river. These are poignant realities that the Kaduna-based publisher failed to internalise all these years.
No doubt, all those that have been following the trajectory of this case are full of expectations that justice will prevail at the end of the epic trial, at least to punish the guilty and redeem the image of the innocent.
Oche, a commentator on national issues, contributed this piece from Wuse Abuja
