Journalist Arrested, Charged Under Cybercrime Law In Nigeria

Mr Obinna Norman, owner and editor-in-chief of online news outlet The Realm News, was arrested on March 1 by police in Umuahia, the capital of Nigeria’s southeastern Abia state, while he was at a local radio station, Flo FM to discuss politics on air, according to the journalist, who spoke to CPJ from Afara prison in Umuahia.

Mr Norman was charged in an Abia state magistrate court under Nigeria’s 2015 cybercrime act. Norman is alleged to have defamed and harassed Abia state senator Theodore Orji of the People’s Democratic Party, according to the journalist and two charge sheets by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CJP).