A group, Yewa Youths Progressive Movement, has decried that Ogun border communities are not safe haven for smugglers nor are its residents smugglers.
The group, in a statement jointly signed by its Chairman and Publicity Secretary, Adeoye Akinola and Sunday Adeyemi, respectively on Friday, in Abeokuta, urged Nigerian investigative journalist, Fisayo Soyombo, to desist from tagging border communities in Ogun West as “smugglers’ posts” and the residents as smugglers.
They noted that the communities do not object to investigative journalists performing their jobs, pointing out that they should not let sensationalism, needless exaggeration, and name-calling control their work.
The YYPM argued that Soyombo’s actions have tarnished the towns and their citizens by portraying Ogun border settlements as smugglers’ havens.
The youth group said that the recent social media post by the investigative journalist that vehicles loaded with foreign parboiled rice had been stationed in some border communities ready to be smuggled into the country, was not only a ruse but a deliberate attempt to further disparage Yewaland in particular and Ogun West in general.
According to the statement traders and residents in the border communities had embraced the announcement of ban on importation of rice through the land borders by the immediate past administration of President Muhammadu Buhari and swiftly diversified into order forms of businesses.
They added that in line with the Federal Government’s eat-what-you-grow policy, a number of business owners in the axis had made significant investments in the production and cultivation of local rice.
The statement reads in part: “As a youth group advocating for the development and growth of border communities in Ogun West Senatorial District of Ogun State, the activities of Mr Soyombo in the name of investigative journalism have no doubt cast negative shadows on our towns and portrayed our people as smugglers.
“It is indeed worrisome that while we are still working to remove the toga and label of smugglers put on some of our legitimate business men by this so-called investigative journalist, he recently posted on the social media that he was aware of about two thousand cars loaded with foreign parboiled rice hidden in the border communities and ready to be smuggled into the country.
“This claim is not only a spurious one, but calculated efforts to mislead the authority concerned and cause unnecessary tension. We are not against journalism aimed at ensuring sanity and engender socio-economic development of the nation, but we condemn in its entirety, sensationalism, unnecessary embellishment, and name-calling.
“Our communities and people who were hitherto into inter-border trading, have since diversified into other legitimate ventures since the announcement of ban on importation of foreign rice through land borders by the immediate past administration of former President Muhammadu Buhari.
“Apart from that, several entrepreneurs in the axis have invested heavily in the cultivation and production of local rice in tandem with the Federal Government’s policy of eat-what-you-grow.
“We, hereby, urge Mr Soyombo to desist from tagging border communities in Ogun State as safe haven for smugglers. As an investigative journalist who is interested in activities of smugglers, we implore him to focus on other border communities in the country and stop engaging in a business of ‘calling a dog a bad name in order to hang it’, in Ogun border communities.”