The Buhari administration on Wednesday continued its pushback against credible reports that it had imposed travel restrictions on key champions of the historic #EndSARS campaign with a letter that requested a retraction from Peoples Gazette.

Officials from the interior ministry arrived Wednesday night bearing a letter that essentially repeated their initial denials that came hours after the Gazette published its findings Tuesday morning on a no-fly list the administration was compiling against notable voices of #EndSARS.

The letter described our publication as “vexatious and capable of undermining the authority and mandate” of both the administration and interior minister Rauf Aregbesola.

But the Gazette stands by its story and says it will never apologise for exposing a clearly sinister and potentially illegal programme that targets citizens for exercising their constitutional rights to demonstrate against a culture of injustice amongst federal agents — especially freedom from decades of unchecked police brutality.

“We will never succumb to federal pressure to back down on a report that was diligently sourced from senior administration officials,” the Gazette’s assistant managing editor John Adenekan said on Thursday morning. “Not when our findings coincided with the implementation of the controversial list as we have seen with those prevented from traveling overseas without official explanation.”

Mr. Adenekan said the government should instead succumb to the public outrage that followed the Gazette’s report on its no-fly list and immediately shut down the controversial programme. 

“Given how we sourced our story from security and administration officials, it is clear that the federal government cannot publicly defend its action because it is not proud of it,” the editor said. “An honourable approach to take next is to shut down the programme forthwith.”

On Monday night, prior to our report on Tuesday morning, a senior official at the interior confirmed to the Gazette the ministry was in charge of a no-fly list. Through the source, the Gazette cited a list of a prominent personality in the campaign. The man’s passport was issued by the Nigerian consulate in Atlanta in February 2016, but his full identity was withheld on legal grounds.

Two senior SSS officials also confirmed the interior ministry was implementing a no-fly list via its immigration office. An SSS official disclosed that six people suspected of playing roles in the #EndSARS campaigns were prevented from boarding flights to Europe and Dubai last week.

The ministry’s claim that there was no attempt to get an official reaction was also false as its spokesman Mohammed Manga was repeatedly called for comments Monday night.

An hour after the Gazette’s publication, a notable champion of #EndSARS publicly confirmed that airport officials prevented her from embarking on a foreign trip on November 1, which the Gazette learnt was to celebrate her birthday on November 2. 

Modupe Odele was actively involved in the protest as a lawyer to the Feminist Coalition, a group of women’s rights activists that helped raised funds and resources towards the protests. Her passport was confiscated by the immigration office, which is domiciled under the interior ministry.

The Gazette again on Tuesday afternoon broke the news that immigration officials declined to return Ms. Odele’s passport, despite spending hours in a bid to resolve the matter. She was asked instead to approach the DIA, an intelligence department of the military, for her passport, our report said based on information obtained from her lawyers.

On Tuesday night, Sahara Reporters published what it learnt of the matter, which included confidential disclosure by immigration officials that it was the military intelligence that compiled a no-fly list and sent it to the immigration.

“The immigration is under the ministry of interior and its activities are regularly reported to the minister,” the Gazette’s legal adviser Inibehe Effiong said on Tuesday morning. “We want the ministry and immigration to stop their hide-and-seek and tell Nigerians what they know about those who were blocked from traveling abroad on the basis of an illegally-generated list.” 

“Trying to save face by threatening a media organisation that exposed their illegal tactics against harmless protesters is highly condemnable and should cease immediately,” Mr. Effiong said.