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Family demands release of editor abducted by police in Abuja
Madu Onuorah, the editor of the online publication Global Upfront, was taken hostage by men from the Nigerian Police on Wednesday.
According to the management, Onuorah—who also serves as the newspaper's publisher and editor-in-chief—was taken away by security personnel at around six o'clock in the evening while his wife and kids watched.
The editor was taken into custody without producing an arrest warrant after approximately ten heavily armed police officers broke into his home in Lugbe, Abuja, using two Sienna buses. Since then, he has not been in contact with his family, attorney, or place of employment.
"Anybody who has any issue against Mr. Onuorah should approach the law court and not turn the Nigeria Police into a Gestapo outfit that bullies a man in the presence of his wife and children," the newspaper's management stated in a statement dated May 23, 2024, and signed by the management.
"Any second Mr. Onuorah spends in police custody constitutes a serious infringement against his fundamental rights and a continuation of the assault on freedom of expression that has become a frequent occurrence in Nigeria recently," the statement said, urging the police to release Onuorah "immediately and unconditionally."
Additionally, the management stated that even though the police officers who kidnapped the EIC of the newspaper were "not of the Lugbe Police Station," they "simply dumped him at the station and left no traces for friends and family members to reach them."
Onuorah is a seasoned journalist who "operates within the ambit of the law." She was previously the managing director of The Authority Newspaper and the chief of The Guardian Newspaper's Abuja bureau.
Nigerian journalists have faced a great deal of criticism recently because Nigeria Police agents kidnapped them in a manner reminiscent of the Gestapo.
On March 15, 2024, Segun Olatunji, the general editor of First News, an online newspaper, was kidnapped from his home in the Iyana Odo, Abule Egba neighbourhood of Lagos State. When he was apprehended, the news platform's employees became alarmed.
The ten armed men, according to his wife Abiodun Olatunji, showed up at their home shortly after six o'clock in the evening and took her husband away without leaving any trace as to where they were taking him.
Defence Intelligence Agency operatives kidnapped Olatunji.
Olatunji left his job on May 8, 2024, concurrently with the news platform's management expressing regret to President Bola Tinubu's chief of staff, Femi Gbajabiamila, for a report that had been posted on the site on January 29, 2024.
"How Gbajabiamila attempted to corner $30bn, 66 houses traced to Sabiu" was the title of Olatunji's piece indicting the former Speaker of the House of Representatives.
On Wednesday, May 1, 2024, Daniel Ojukwu, a journalist employed by the Foundation for Investigative Journalism, was kidnapped by Olukayode Egbetokun's Intelligence Response Team, the Inspector-General of Police.
Ojukwu was transported to the Nigeria Police Force National Cybercrime Centre in Abuja after he was charged with breaking the 2015 Cybercrime Act.
On Friday, May 10, 2024, he was freed following demonstrations in Abuja by a few civil society organisations.