A former presidential aide, Mr Reno Omokri, has appealed to foreign media, including the British Broadcasting Corporation, Sky News, and Deutsche Welle, to balance their stories on the senator representing Kogi Central Senatorial District, Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, and her allegation of sexual harassment against the President of the Senate, Senator Godswill Akpabio.
A flurry of reactions has greeted the allegation, with the Kogi Central senator utilising several media outlets, including influential foreign platforms, to push her case.
However, Omokri cautioned the foreign media to tread carefully, given the background of Akpoti-Uduaghan, who he claimed had levied false allegations against other prominent citizens.
“I am not sure that it serves the public interest of justice to publish Senator Natasha Akpoti’s current allegations against Nigeria’s Senate President without also informing your viewers that this woman has a history of making false and unfounded allegations after altercations with men,” he said in a statement on Saturday, adding, “In the interest of transparency, please balance your coverage.”
Omokri said he was once a victim of Akpoti-Uduaghan’s false allegation, “Senator Natasha Akpoti, whom you have repeatedly given a platform, falsely accused me of the same offence for which she now accuses Senator Godswill Akpabio in 2021, after an altercation with me.”
He said she retracted, then deleted her accusations when he proved with unimpeachable evidence, including his passport stamp and a first-class British Airways ticket, that he was not in Nigeria during a May 6, 2014, state banquet for Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, which was the date and time when she falsely claimed he sexually harassed her.
“On the contrary, my boss, then President Goodluck Jonathan, had sent me as a Special Envoy to the United States in the heat of the Chibok Girls’ abduction and the ensuing #BringBackOurGirls campaign, which involved then US First Lady Michelle Obama. From there, I flew to see my children in California,” he explained.
He said he accepted an out-of-court settlement and a hefty monetary compensation following her fiancée’s intervention and a clergyman’s intervention to get her off the hook of a defamation suit he instituted to clear his name.
He stated, “After retracting her lies and deleting the video she had made levelling her accusations against me and peddling sundry other untruths, her then fiancée, Mr Emmanuel Oritsejolomi Uduaghan, now her husband, called me on a three-way call with a major Christian clergyman and appealed to me, as a pastor, to accept an out-of-court settlement, which I did. I was subsequently paid considerable money, which was styled as an offering.”
Omokri said while he could not ascertain the truth of Akpoti-Uduaghan’s allegation against Akpabio, he opined that the claim was suspect because of her record of levelling false accusations against prominent persons.
“I am not a statistician. However, if you ask me, I would suspect that the chances that a former presidential spokesman, a cabinet minister, and a Senate president all sexually harassed the same woman are slim to none,” he said, adding, “Consequently, I urge you to be conscious that getting the facts right is the cardinal principle of journalism.”
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