By Adesina Soyooye
The family of The Nation Newspaper’s Chairman of Editorial Board and Columnist, Sam Omatseye, has appealed to those upset with a column he wrote, recently to, please, not harm him over it.
In an article he wrote on August 1, 2022, titled OBI-TUARY, Sam Omatseye clearly, most people agree, in his overzealousness to sell the candidacy of his benefactor, Bola Tinubu, the Presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, and to run down Peter Obi, the Presidential candidate of the Labour Party, LP, crossed the borderline. In doing so – from the title to the the last word – the columnist also tried to incite other Nigerian tribes against the Igbo tribe. He dismissed Obi, who he clearly sees as a threat to Tinubu’s aspiration, as an Igbo agenda.
The article sparked outrage and, so, immediate and angry responses from many quarters. In a tweet, the writer suddenly alleged his life was under threat by the OBIdients – the supporters of the Peter Obi Presidential ambition.
Reacting to the deluge of negative reactions against the writer and his write-up, the patriarch of his family – the Omatseyes from Warri, Delta State – Professor Jim Nesin Omatseye – has pleaded with those offended by the article to not harm the columnist.
The Nation quoted the Professor as telling them on phone that the negative reactions were a result of “the high level of poverty, insecurity among other menaces facing the nation”, and so people are “in dire need of positive change”
Said the Professor: “I want to react to the negative reaction that is coming from many quarters as a result of the article, Obi-tuary, which was written by Sam Omatseye, who is a member of my family.
“The reaction that is trailing that publication, I believe, is as a result of what is happening in the country; the state of insecurity, the high level of poverty, the suffering of so many people. And as a result of this, people are looking for change, whether from the right or from the left.
“The regular parties have people who have disappointed a lot of people in the country as a result of these challenges and people are looking for change.
“Whatever it is that Sam has written, it’s his personal opinion to which he is entitled. But he should not be threatened by anyone because he’s doing his job as a journalist.
“It is not all the time that what journalists say, everybody agrees with. Therefore, we want to say, from the perspective of the family that he should not be threatened or harmed by anyone.
“We plead with the public and those who disagree with him, to not do anything that will be detrimental to him”
