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‘Unauthorized’ — Ajuri Ngelale Knocks Bayo Onanuga For ‘False’ Statement On Tinubu’s May 29 Address
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All does not appear to be well within the presidency media team.
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President Tinubu’s top spokespersons, Ajuri Ngelale and Bayo Onanuga, can’t publicly agree on their principal’s schedule.
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The spokespersons released conflicting statements on the president’s schedule for May 29.
Eko Hot Blog reports that Ajuri Ngelale, the Special Adviser to President Bola Tinubu on Media & Publicity, has debunked a statement made by Bayo Onanuga, the president’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy.
Ngelale took an apparent swipe at Onanuga, his counterpart in the president’s media team, in a statement on Tuesday night.
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Earlier on Tuesday, Onanuga had announced that Tinubu would address a joint session of the National Assembly to mark his first anniversary as the leader of Nigeria.
“President Tinubu’s speech will dwell on the achievements of his administration and Nigeria’s democracy since the military ceded power in 1999,” he said.
“At the end of the speeches, President Tinubu will commission the National Assembly Library and Resource Center, now to be known as Bola Ahmed Tinubu Building,” Onanuga added.
President Bola Tinubu addressing a Joint Session of the National Assembly
However, in a public rebuke of his fellow Tinubu spokesperson, Ngelale said the statement was “false and unauthorised”, confusing the public.
“In view of public commentary concerning the President delivering a speech before a Joint Sitting of the National Assembly tomorrow, May 29, 2024, it is important to state that this information is false and unauthorized as the Office of the President was not involved in the planning of the event,” the president’s spokesperson said.
It was not immediately clear why both presidential spokespersons are at odds in public.
A Concerning History of Misinformation in the Presidency
It is not the first time that the Nigerian presidency under Tinubu has misinformed the public.
Last year, Eko Hot Blog detailed at least three instances where different presidential spokespersons released false and misleading public statements.
Particularly, in September 2023, Ngelale erroneously claimed that both Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) had agreed to resume visa issuance, saying airlines were to immediately resume flight schedules into and out of Nigeria.
However, the UAE refused to confirm the agreement and the visa ban is yet to be lifted. The president’s spokesperson later walked back his misleading statement, saying he did not mean that things would go back to “business as usual”, especially as it concerns UAE visa applications and processing.
In March 2024, Onanuga also falsely claimed that the UAE had resumed visa services for Nigerians, citing an unsigned and fake correspondence.
Three hours later, he deleted his statement and issued a disclaimer, saying the Arab nation was yet to resume visa issuance to Nigerians.
“The document in circulation is not authorized either by the Nigerian government or the UAE,” he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
However, the presidential spokesperson shared same unauthorized document with the public.
FURTHER READING
It is unclear why Onanuga, a presidential spokesperson, publicly shared an unverified document.
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