By Danlami Nmodu
There was a mild drama Wednesday morning at the Nicon –Luxury venue of ‘Global Forum for Partnerships on Media and Information Literacy ,Incorporating The International Conference on MIL and Intercultural Dialogue’. Newsdaryonline.com learnt that the mild drama began when some officials sighted copies of Abuja based Youth Link magazine being given free to guests and the official attempted to stop the distribution .One of the “offensive” magazines was January –May 2012 edition with a banner headline:#Occupy Nigeria-The Rage of a Nation over Corruption and Hike in Fuel Price
One eye witness said suddenly some officials from the National Library of Nigeria came and asked the young men in charge of the magazine to stop distributing them because “ the stories portray Nigeria in a bad light” .Even when the officials were told that YouthLink has been distributed world- wide already, they would not give up. At some point another official who claimed he was a journalist told those distributing the magazines that he had reviewed them and the content was not good for the image of Nigeria.
“One of the officials said, we can give it to Nigerians, but we should not give it to foreigners because the magazines portray the country in a bad light.But when I wanted to know why,or what they exactly they found disagreeable, there was no answer.One of them pledged to get back to me but I have not seen anyone” one of those involved in the mild drama told Newsdiaryonline.com.And since the attempt to stop the magazine was resisted, the men in charge of YouthLink and other materials continued to display them and guests picked them at will.
Attempts by Newsdiaryonline.com to confirm the story from officials of the National Library at the venue revealed yet another dramatic scene and denial.One of the officials contacted confirmed that “they said they saw something that was not good”.Suddenly , the official realised something and stopped talking and walked away, directing the reporter to meet another official for further briefing.
Another older official from the National Library vehemently denied being behind the attempts to stop the distribution of YouthLink. “No no ,not me.Some officials just told me that they have seen some magazines that contained some materials that are not good for the image of Nigeria.I told them to see the publisher and see what it is all about…” This official claimed not to have even read the content of the magazine.”I didn’t go through ,I couldn’t have stopped it”, adding “You know at National Library we champion freedom of Information”.The official insisted that “those who tried to stop the distribution of the magazines were not from National Library”.The two officials contacted did not give their names but they were wearing T-shirts with the inscription National Library of Nigeria.
This denial left eye witnesses wondering what was going on. Meanwhile, the Forum which is a 3-day event has commenced in Abuja.It is expected to end on Friday June 28th,2013.
