Newswatch: We’re naïve to have trusted Ibrahim – Ekpu, others

[MrVan]

By  CLIFFORD NDUJIHE

THE face-off between Mr. Jimoh Ibrahim and four founders of the Newswatch Magazine, Messrs Ray Ekpu, Dan Agbese, Yakubu Mohammed and Soji Akinrinade, over the affairs of the organization, yesterday, took a turn for the worse with the foursome lamenting that they were naïve to have trusted Ibrahim.

Reason: Ibrahim has suspended publication of Newswatch, the first time it has happened in over 28 years, and has failed to completely honour the shares purchase agreement entitling him to 51 per cent shares of the company, among others.

Responding to a statement titled: Stop the Crocodile Tears (Part 1), published by Ibrahim-owned Global Media Mirror Limited recently, in which they were said to have been sacked from the board of the company, they stated that they had retired from their offices not from the board of Newswatch Communications Limited.

In a four-page statement titled: A Litany of lies, they wondered why Ibrahim was owing workers four months salary as of August 2012, failed to pay the balance of N500 million he was to pay the company as part of his 51 per cent share-holding and refused to remit to the tax authorities, the 10 per cent of money he deducted from their retirement benefits.

Claiming that Ibrahim did not pay them the retirement benefits in full as published as they agreed he could deduct money and pay the tax authorities, they challenged him to produce the receipts of the tax payment.

Vanguard Nigeria

[Florence Amara]

Corruption even in media houses, we ar really in trouble in this nation