Shafi’u Tureta, the media aide to Aminu Tambuwal, a senator representing sokoto south has been arraigned before a chief magistrate court in Sokoto state on Monday for allegedly defaming the Sokoto state governor, Ahmad Aliyu.
Journalists were however barred from covering the proceedings on the order of the chief magistrate, Fati Hassan according to reports.
The suspect was allegedly accused of spreading unlawful media content and was detained by the police on August 25, 2024, before his first arraignment in court on Monday.
According to the police’s first information report (FIR) the government charged Tureta with circulating injurious falsehood and engraving matter known to be defamatory, which was said to have contravened the Penal Code, these offences he committed on 18th July 2024.
Tureta was also accused of sharing a document that purportedly showed that Aliyu scored F9 in English Language in the senior school certificate examination (SSCE).
In addition, the aide had posted a video showing the spraying of dollar notes during the birthday celebration of Fatima, the governor’s wife.
Tureta is also accused of sharing videos to mock the governor for not “being fluent in English”.
Shafi’u Tureta is the special assistant on local and digital media to Tambuwal, the former governor of Sokoto who served from 2015 to 2023.
Calling for his release is Amnesty International Nigeria who tagged the arrest as unacceptable. The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Sokoto state has also condemned the arrest of the aide saying it’s not a crime to post the video of a governor. In a statement by Hassan Sahabi Sanyinnawal, the Sokoto PDP spokesperson, he said:
“We, first of all, wish to draw the attention of the Governor to the fact that the visuals in question must have been recorded by camera men attached to his own office or his family and initially leaked to the public by the same personnel.
“It is also not a crime under Nigerian law to make public, videos of the Governor’s public engagements or of events attended by his family, however embarrassing they may be.“It is therefore, his task or that of his aides to ensure that such materials do not get to the public arena.
“The PDP wishes to caution the Sokoto State Government of its fast worsening human rights record, occasioned by its notoriety for harassment and assault on dissenting opinion.
“We hereby, counsel Ahmed Aliyu to turn his energy towards improving on the dismal performance of his regime, rather than the desperate struggle to stifle freedom of expression in the state.”
By the provisions of Section 375 of the Criminal Code Act, any person who publishes any defamatory matter is guilty of a misdemeanor and is liable to imprisonment for one year; and any person who publishes any defamatory matter knowing it to be false, is liable to imprisonment for two years.
