Daud Olatunji
As Nigeria joins the world to mark the 2025 World Press Freedom Day, fresh reports by media rights groups have shown that no fewer than 150 Nigerian journalists have been either killed, attacked, detained or harassed between 2020 and 2024.
PLATFORM TIMES reports that at least 150 Nigerian journalists have been killed, assaulted, unlawfully detained or harassed in the last five years, according to findings by leading press freedom advocacy organisations, including the International Press Centre, Reporters Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Journalists.
The disturbing figure comes as Nigeria joins the rest of the world to commemorate the 2025 World Press Freedom Day, with media practitioners lamenting a rapidly shrinking civic space and an atmosphere of fear and intimidation.
A combined analysis of reports by the three groups shows that 25 journalists lost their lives under suspicious or confirmed violent circumstances between 2020 and 2024, while over 100 others were harassed, detained, or assaulted, mostly by security operatives and political actors.
In its 2024 Press Freedom report, the International Press Centre (IPC) recorded 45 separate incidents of attacks on journalists in 2023 alone.
These included the physical assault of reporters covering protests, arrests of investigative journalists, and raids on media houses by government agencies.
One of the most high-profile cases was the killing of Alex Ogbu, a journalist shot during a protest in Abuja in January 2020. Despite multiple calls for justice by civil society groups, no one has been held accountable.
“Journalists in Nigeria are working under siege,” said Lanre Arogundade, Executive Director of IPC. “From security agents to political actors, the message is clear — critical voices are not welcome. This is a direct threat to democracy.”
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) also listed Nigeria among the countries with the highest levels of press repression in sub-Saharan Africa in its 2024 global press freedom update.
According to CPJ, several journalists remain behind bars or in legal limbo over reports exposing corruption and security lapses.
Furthermore, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranked Nigeria 123rd out of 180 countries in its 2024 World Press Freedom Index, a fall from 115th in 2021 — an indication of growing censorship, harassment, and self-censorship within the Nigerian press.
As World Press Freedom Day is marked under the theme “A Press for the Planet: Journalism in the Face of the Environmental Crisis”, Nigerian journalists say they are still fighting for the basic right to report without intimidation.
Recent cases have seen journalists detained while covering illegal mining in the North-West and oil pollution in the Niger Delta.
Two reporters working on a documentary about deforestation in Kaduna were detained for five days in April without charges.
“Before we can talk about journalism for development or the environment, we must first be free to do our jobs without fear,” said Tomiwa Adeyemi, a Lagos-based investigative journalist.
The Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) and several civil society organisations have called on the Federal Government to urgently enact legislation to protect journalists and prosecute individuals and institutions behind attacks on media professionals.
Despite constitutional guarantees under Section 39 of the 1999 Constitution, the watchdog role of the Nigerian press remains under threat, prompting observers to question the government’s true commitment to freedom of expression.
“No journalist should be killed or jailed for doing their job,” Arogundade stressed.
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