President-elect, Muhammadu Buhari today barred the African Independent Television (AIT) from covering his functions. This came as the security men attached to him barred the station’s correspondent, simply identified as Bebei, from covering happening at Buhari’s residence.
Vanguard gathered that the directive was discreetly given to the correspondent by an official at the Defence House where the crew had gone to cover the visit of Cuban ambassador to Buhari.
Although there was no official order that could be referred to as barring the reporter, the action might have been due to the sour relationship between the All Progressives Congress (APC), its leaders and the television station.
Daar Communications, owners of AIT had in January alleged massive fraud by agents of the APC in its online Presidential Poll.
A statement signed by the Management of Daar Communication said it shut down the website www.aitonline.tv where a poll was conducted between Buhari and President Goodluck Jonathan ahead of the presidential election. According to Daar, the unique IP addresses were significantly less than the numbers of votes polled raising suspicions.
It said a forensic test carried out had shown that 30 identified unique IP addresses had voted 4,969 in favor of General Muhammadu Buhari, the APC Presidential candidate.
Days later, the APC called for the investigation of AIT for broadcasting what it called “fabricated and hate broadcast” against its presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari.
It is, however, unclear whether these happenings are connected with the recent barring of the AIT reporter.
