Fejiro Oliver, The Journalist With A Questionable Agenda On Delta State Government, By Dr Ephraim Okwuosa

There is no doubt that Fejiro Oliver has been treated so generously by some politicians that patronize his type of awful journalism. In fact, Fejiro’s media participation as a journalist has thrived primarily because of the weakness of politicians and spinelessness top ranking public officers to confront his misdemeanour and erratic attitude as a blackmailer.

Recently, Fejiro is known to have been exposed over an unsuccessful transaction and sad encounter in an attempt to extort fifty million naira from the past Niger State Governor as narrated in the story and link “Niger State Gov’t Releases Evidence Arrested NTA Reporter, Fejiro Oliver, Demanded Bribe”- http://saharareporters.com/2014/09/23/niger-state-gov%E2%80%99t-releases-evidence-arrested-nta-reporter-fejiro-oliver-demanded-bribe.

Realistically, Fejiro Oliver is an amateurish journalist that writes as someone that is not accountable to the public but his personal interests. In fact, no polity watcher or newspaper reader would have heard about him if not for the internet or digital age because no mainstream media will agree to be used for such libellous stories.

If the truth be told, in Fejiro’s self-styled journalism, there is no such thing as integrity as he delights in disturbing the peace of persons in public office and top politicians with the primary intent of blackmailing or extorting money from them on the basis of outrageous falsehoods and biased stories through the use of his friendly online media contacts.

In fact, the online media outfit ‘Secret Reporters’ which he purports to be the publisher  is best described as the most prejudiced and untrustworthy source of information. This is really huge shame for someone that parades himself as an investigative reporter yet he neither has the openness of mind to conduct simple research on people he writes about nor stick to basic principles of journalism.

Simply put, my major reservation on Fejiro’s manner of distortion of facts and delivery of news stories is because of his blatantly vicious attitude when he writes against those that refuse to patronize his greed. This is why I believe that in a proper democracy, there will be no space for Fejiro’s participation in journalism.

In all his contributions to journalism, Fejiro is a man that rarely maintains objectivity in whatever he writes because he runs more of sensationalist agenda than credible news reporting. Sadly, many people that have commented on his articles have complained that his behaviour is so unprofessional and does not in any way reflect trustworthy journalism. On this, I say a big YES because by and large, a visit to Google search engine would clearly reveal that most of his articles on the internet are full of lies and contradictions as he engages in one-source reporting, telling blatant lies with vitriolic and baseless shrill accusations.

With all sense of modesty but frankness, Fejiro emerges as a man that is more committed to extortion than quality journalism.

Unfortunately, the big casualty is Nigeria’s democracy and crime fighting agencies that he complicates their tasks with falsehoods. Nevertheless, there is really no point to thrust all blames on Fejiro Oliver because in all his actions in the media, he has never been requested to pay any permit or license fee to stay fervently dedicated to objectivity in whatever he writes. I guess this why even though he does not have the reputation for inquisitive writing, he still claims something that is huge mockery to journalism.

In fact, I sympathize with him on his limited education each time he ends his stories with the title ‘Investigative Journalist’. In any case, thanks to this new media era where any person can be a news reporter and even use unreliable sources of information to background a story.

That Fejiro’s reckless disregard for objectivity and attraction to extortion does not conform to any journalistic standard or convention is huge menace to the reading public and Nigerian media practitioners. His regular engagement in falsehood camouflaged as news reporting is indecent journalism that only fits a selfish agenda at the detriment of the general public and the people he defames with no proof.

This pattern of Fejiro’s deceptive journalism should be condemned and resisted as it is not only a potential source of danger to honest and responsible journalism but has the potency to make any innocent Nigeria a victim of extortion.

Given Fejiro’s knack for casing noxious stories against any person he perceives as a viable target for extortion, I strongly believe that there exist a long list of victims of his atrocious journalism. In fact his recent circulated story on the internet regarding the Delta State Government  which he captioned ‘Reflection Of Delta At 25: And Governor Ifeanyi Okowa Goofed in His Moment Of Glory’ is dubious.

Actually, I laughed immediately I noticed the source of the story and my conclusion before reading it was that the article would not be done from a neutral standpoint and I was proved right even in the first paragraph because the reality on Governor Okowa’s led Delta State is totally different from Fejiro’s imagination and fabrications in the story.

It is clear fact, that for many years, on Delta State governance, Fejiro has been running a big project of lies and deception with ulterior motives because he believes that once he writes against any top government official, the gullible public must believe it must be true with such sham intimidating status, his victims become viable targets for extortion. However, on this Fejiro’s slanted opinion on

Governor Ifeanyi Okowa, I think he deeply went off point.

In fact, whatever Fejiro has written does not reflect how the Delta majority public rates Governor Ifeanyi Okowa’s administration and any person with good knowledge of Delta State politics ought to know that Fejiro is more of a political prostitute than journalist. Fejiro’s usual practice of using criticism to attract a cloud of speculation against his targets has failed on Governor Okowa. Certainly, the very long list of articles on the internet that Fejiro has written in praise of the Delta State government efforts, most likely before his romance with the government went soar clearly exposes his dirty underbelly in his practice of unethical journalism.

Consequently, any objective analyst on the above referenced story on Delta State will agree that the contents are overtly biased as it is obvious that writer of such is a turncoat in search of relevance and economic patronage. Infact, on Fejiro’s assessment of Governor Okowa, he slid to absurdity when he introduced the recent celebration of Delta State’s 25 years anniversary in relation to the issue of non-recognition of the duo of  Great Ogboru and Otega Emerhor, two political rivals of the incumbent Governor and failed aspirants in the past Delta State governorship election. Indeed, Fejiro’s narration on Governor Okowa’s administration is not only very unfair but grossly inaccurate and depicts a desperate writer that is more interested in prospecting for his economic gains than maintaining high standards of journalism.

Until Fejiro Oliver accepts the real ethics of journalistic practice and dumps his load of rubbish journalism by learning to stand by the premise of his stories with convincing logic, it would not be surprising if such a shameless journalist ends up in jail especially if he encounters someone that cannot tolerate his malicious acts.

Indeed. I think it is high time, online media publishers focused on more rigorous and intelligent discussions on Delta State for the interest of its readers rather than publishing articles from a skewed journalist like Fejiro Oliver that lacks the common sense capacity and intellectual ability to string together a good logic on important matters.

Dr Ephraim Okwuosa

Co-ordinator, Anti Corruption Advocates, Area 11, Garki, Abuja.