Nigeria: We've Petitioned BBC Over Report On Tinubu's Certificate - Atiku's Aide

13 October 2023

Phrank Shaibu, a Special Assistant on Public Communication to the Presidential Candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2023 general elections, Atiku Abubakar, has said that they have petitioned the BBC over a report on Tinubu's certificate.

In a report titled "Bola Tinubu diploma: No evidence Nigeria's president forged college record", BBC analyzed the controversy surrounding the certificate President Bola Ahmed Tinubu submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), saying there is no evidence that the president forged the certificate.

But during an interview on Channels TV's Politics Today, Shaibu said the matter had been taken up with the BBC top management.

"When they said a report by the BBC, I laughed at the level of pedestrianism. The three young people who wrote that report are not even in the employment of the BBC. They are just like a fact-checking team. Let me take one of the authors of that report, Olaronke Alo. As of 2019, he was a reporter and presenter at TVC owned by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

"We don't need the services of a clairvoyant to know how the stories were put together. The first paragraph will tell you they got the true certified copy of the position from Frank Shaibu. One of the reporters asked me for it and I sent it to her.

"The same report claims that when they tried to reach the Atiku media team, we did not respond. This we have taken up with the top management and we have written a petition to the BBC because they allowed their platform to be used for a hatched job like this."

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