Buhari meets with Tunde Thompson, Journalist he jailed 31 years ago

It was a dramatic moment on Tuesday when the president-elect, General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd), met with Mr. Tunde Thompson, one of the journalists he jailed under the Decree 4 in 1984 when he was a military Head of State.

Thompson, ironically was a member of the media team of the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential campaign organisation that coordinated the media activities of Buhari in the just-concluded election.

The president-elect, while receiving the entire media team at the Defence House, Abuja, praised Thompson for rising above his jail experience to forgive and support him, adding that what happened under his military regime was one of the challenges of that period.

He commended members of his media team led by Malam Shehu Garba for running a very “decent media campaign” despite the vigorous hate campaigns mounted against him by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

He was full of praises for the APC Presidential Campaign Media and Publicity members, saying they have reason to thank God and celebrate the success of the entire campaign.

“I want to commend you especially for two things. First, is the decent media campaign you conducted. Despite the PDP’s dirty tactics, you stayed focused on issues and avoided the temptation to sling mud.”

The president-elect particularly commended the Director of Media and Publicity, Shehu, for providing leadership that led to the success of his team.

“I thank you for your uncommon motivation to do the work. Despite the shoestring budget on which we ran our APC campaign, you did not allow the lack of adequate remuneration to stall the work at any point in time. You continued to give your best.”

The president-elect praised ,INEC for deploying technology as part of the process of the last election with the use of permanent voters’ cards (PVCs) and card readers.

“We must commend Nigerians who believe in our message of change and INEC for introducing card readers and PVC. All elected leaders, will now know that the voter is the king. Nigerians now have more faith in our elections because their votes will count.

“If not for PVCs and card readers the PDP as usual would have written the results and asked losers to go to court. How can people who are struggling to survive go to court and get money to pay the SANs of this world. We must thank God for the success of this election,” he said.