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Woman Blasts BBC For Erroneous Profiling Of New DCP, Tunji Disu

Published

3 years ago

Aug 9, 2021.

Woman Blasts BBC For Erroneous Profiling Of New DCP, Tunji Disu

In a post which titled “On DCP Tunji Disu BBC Lied,” she questioned why a reputable medium like the BBC would disseminate such misinformation without verifying the facts.

An old schoolmate of Tunji Disu, newly appointed Head of Intelligence Response Team of the Nigerian Police Force who identified herself as Ngozi Asoya has faulted the egregious blunders made by the pidgin version of the British Broadcasting Corporation in their profiling of the new IRT Boss.

Recall that the Inspector-General of Police, Usman Alkali Baba, had appointed Tunji Disu, a former commander of the Rapid Response Squad to provisionally replace beleaguered supercop, Abba Kyari who is currently under investigation for allegedly colluding with popular internet fraudster, Ramon “Hushpuppi” Abass in a $1.1m fraudulent scheme.

Following his promotion, the BBC Pidgin published a brief profile of Tunji Disu, where-in it made notable factual blunders mostly bordering around his age and religious inclination.

In a post titled “On DCP Tunji Disu BBC Lied,” Asoya questioned why a reputable medium like the BBC would disseminate such misinformation without verifying the facts.

She wrote:

The British Broadcasting Coorporation (BBC) lied about Olatunji Disu, the Head Inspector-General’s Response Team (IRT). Could it have been an honest error, an act of reckless journalism or a reflection of dwindling standards?

DCP Olatunji Rilwan Disu, whose story the news organ ran on their pidgin English edition (https://www.bbc.com/pidgin/58053283) was my classmate at the Lagos State University, Ojo, Lagos, (LASU), so I know him very well. We were in the same class, pursued the same qualifications and graduated the same year (1989). And I’m certain that he is the same person that the BBC report identified as the former Commander RRS. I would have made a rejoinder to them but they do not have space for comments after their articles. But I just felt like alerting you that even the almighty BBC is not infallible. They can also get it wrong and this time terribly too.

BBC wrongly referred to this classmate of mine, who is younger than me by two (2) years in the following words: “Tunji Disu Biography Na for Lagos state Southwest Nigeria dem born Oga Tunji Disu for April 17, 1960.”

This information is factually wrong on three (3) grounds:

1. He was born on 13 NOT 17 April.
2. He was born in 1966 NOT 1960 as wrongly published.
3. Tunji is NOT a Christian. He is a Muslim .

His records of birth should be available to the BBC and any news agencies that wants to find out at the Police records office and numerous other official sources such as the RRS where he was the immediate past commander. However, the BBC decided to publish misleading information about the Police Officer’s age. In a country where age determines many things including retirement, that BBC misinformation needs to be called out. Why would such an assumed reputable organisation become an agent of confusion? And, still not have a clear mechanism for feedback collection? There should be a comments space for feedbacks for readers but BBC feels infallible and millions take their reports as gospel. I can imagine how a person untrained in information management would struggle to correct this terrible error. Almost nigh impossible.

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I always thought of BBC as a news agent of high repute. I know that the organization is well respected in the eyes of their distinguished readers, including other media organisations. Any publication in any of its organs is therefore accepted as the complete truth.