TheCable, many newspapers barred from covering 2018 budget presentation

The Department of State Services (DSS) has barred some journalists, including TheCable’s national assembly correspondent, from covering the presentation of 2018 budget.

President Muhammadu Buhari is expected to lay the budget before a joint session of the national assembly at 2:00pm on Tuesday.

However, many national assembly correspondents were restricted from the house of representatives – venue of the presentation.

After passing through many screening points, some reporters were denied access to the gallery of the house of representatives to observe the session.

All efforts to make the DSS officials at the entrance of the gallery see reasons with the journalists did not yield any result.

The affected reporters wondered why their names were missing on the list of the secret police when other security agencies at the national assembly had their names.

“Why is my name not here when I saw it at every other checkpoint? You people don’t want us to do our job today right?” a journalist lamented.

One of the DSS officials said they were acting on orders from above. Another official later said they were expecting an updated list but as of the time of this report was filed, the reporters were still stranded.

However, some journalists were given access.