Newspaper Threatens To Sue PDP Over N7m Advert Debt

PDP National Chairman Mu'azu

The New Telegraph newspapers has petitioned the Peoples Democratic Party Chairman, Adamu Mu’azu, over the refusal of the disbanded PDP Presidential Declaration Committee to settle a N6.9m advertisement debt.

The media organisation threatened to institute a legal action against the PDP, if it fails to settle the debt within two weeks.

The media outfit in the petition by a Kaduna-based lawyer, Festus Okoye, alleged that the committee headed by Senator Aniete Okon failed to settle advertisements bill it placed in several newspapers on December 24, 2014.

Okoye, in the petition dated May 11, 2015, stated that his client, Ibrahim Musa, the Bureau Chief of New Telegraph newspaper in Kaduna State had placed centre spread advertisements in Daily Trust, Leadership, The Sun and Vanguard newspapers on the instruction of Dr. Okey Ikechukwu, a member of the PDP Presidential Declaration Committee.

Okoye added that four months after, several efforts to get the committee to redeem its pledge yielded no result.

The petition partly read, “Our client has exercised sufficient restraint in relation to the payment for these advertisements and his integrity and the livelihood of some of his colleagues are at stake.

“We plead that you use your good offices to ensure that our client is paid to enable him to meet his own commitments to his colleagues and their newspaper medium. Our client has given us the mandate to use all legal and constitutional means to affirm the integrity of the contract but we feel that we should explore an amicable resolution of this matter.”

But the PDP National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, said he was not aware of the petition, noting however that the declaration committee was not created by the PDP, but by the Presidency.

He said, “No, I am not aware of the letter. Until I see a copy of the letter, I cannot comment, but the committee wasn’t set up by the party; it was a creation of the Presidency.’’