Protest as presidency, APC bar journalists from covering NEC

There was a mild drama at the venue of the National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting of the All Progressives Congress (APC) on Thursday as security officials selectively screened journalists.
Scores of reporters were barred from covering the event held at the national secretariat of the party in Abuja.
Some of the journalists protested the ‘selective’ screening but this fell on deaf ears of the security officials who insisted that they were acting on ‘instructions from above’.
Freedom Online learned that a presidency official gave the order “because of the way the APC national chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, has been subjected to series of media attacks lately”.
One of the officials brought out a list from where he reeled out names of media outfits approved to cover the event.
While trying to justify the action, the party’s Assistant Director of Publicity, Edegbe Odemwingie, declared that after security officials screened names of the media outfits, the accreditation was done on Wednesday night.
Many of the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party denied knowledge of the action.
One of them said: “I am hearing this for the first time. It was when I saw the crowd of protesting journalists that I asked another member what happened and he told me they were barred from covering our meeting. I don’t know why anybody will approve of this action because we have nothing to hide. I will discuss the matter with our national chairman later”.