A television journalist was beaten inside a Lagos council secretariat on Tuesday in an attack allegedly orchestrated by associates of a sitting local government chairman, raising fresh alarm over the deteriorating safety of reporters covering government activities in the state.
Habeeb Adejobi, a reporter with Muri International Television (MITV), was assaulted within the Kosofe Local Government Area secretariat while on official assignment to cover the screening of newly appointed supervisors and special advisers to council chairman Mr Moyo Ogunlewe.
Adejobi told colleagues that a group of young men set upon him without warning shortly after he arrived at the premises. He identified the alleged ringleader as the chairman’s personal driver.
“They were led by a man people around identified as the chairman’s driver,” he said. “I was there to do my job. There was no provocation.”
The attack triggered tension at the secretariat as bystanders and colleagues rushed to intervene. Adejobi was subsequently taken to the Area Police Station, where the Divisional Police Officer, Mr Kayode, stepped in to defuse the situation.
The DPO confirmed the matter was brought to his attention by the council chairman’s Chief of Staff, Mr Abiona Akinola, and that an effort to resolve the matter was ongoing. Adejobi was later released following police intervention.
Kosofe Local Government Council had issued no official statement by the time of publication.
The assault is not an isolated incident. Just weeks earlier, suspected loyalists of the same council chairman were implicated in a violent confrontation during an All Progressives Congress ward congress held at the party secretariat in the area, during which party chieftain Kehinde Saka was allegedly beaten.
The pattern of violence has drawn sharp criticism from journalists and press freedom advocates, who are calling on authorities to guarantee the safety of reporters and other citizens carrying out lawful duties within political and government spaces.
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