What can be regarded as Andy Uba formula became part of the political lexicon after the recently concluded Anambra guber election.
The APC candidate at the election, Andy Uba claimed to have won his party primaries with a bogus figure and scored far less than that figure in the general election.
The same scenario is rearing his ugly head at the Edo State Chapter of Nigerian Union of Journalists, NUJ, no thanks to the ITV Chapel.
Chairman of ITV Chapel, Best Mbiere, in her submission via WhatsApp platform had claimed that her station that earlier paraded 80 names as delegates for the Edo NUJ 2021 polls coming up on December 17th has ballooned the figure to be 157 in less than 72 hours when the assumed authentic list was pasted on the Edo NUJ Secretariat notice board.
According to her, the station has extra 77 names which was not earlier captured.
The ITV chapel election which produced Best Mbierebere as chairman was held on 23rd December, 2020, eleven months ago. In that election, Mbiere polled 50 votes against 10 by her colleagues, making a total of 65 delegates.
If ITV Chapel now claim to have 157 members in November, it then follows that between December 23rd, 2020 and Nov,2021, the highly respected Esama of Benin, Chief Gabriel Osawaru Igbinedion had employed more than 77 journalists not staff in his TV station’s office in Benin.
A claim many have doubts if any station, especially a private organization, can afford to have such bogus figure as staff within one year.
On the other will the ITV management in payment or remittance of tax support the figure of journalists on their pay roll. Also, are the 157 staff all domiciled in Edo State?
The politicians will indeed be happy that journalists are learning fast the Yahoo style from them.
Meanwhile, a zonal official of the Union, the Zone F Vice President is been awaited to arrive Benin on Tuesday, November 23rd, 2021, to intervene in and resolve the knotty situation.
Discussion about this post