Abuja, July 9, 2024—Police in Kaduna, the capital of northern Kaduna State, detained Gabriel Idibia, a correspondent and freelancer with the privately owned Daily Times and Daybreak Nigeria news sites, on June 11 for photographing them guiding cattle across a road, Idibia and Daybreak Nigeria publisher Austin Maho told CPJ.
Idibia said he was driving to work around 8:30 a.m. when he noticed an unusual number of cows causing a traffic jam on a highway in Sabo, a town within Kaduna. The road was divided in two lanes, and the cows were being escorted in one lane by armed police officers driving in two official vans.
With plans to report on the cows, Idibia said he approached two officers separately to inquire about what was happening, but they did not respond. When Idibia took a photograph, one officer seized his phone, and another collected Idibia’s media identity card, he told CPJ.
Idibia said the officers ordered him to enter their van, and drove him to the police station where one officer chastised him for asking questions about their work and punched Idibia in his left eye, causing the journalist to fall to the floor.
Idibia said the officers compelled him to write a statement saying that he had disrupted their work, instructed him to unlock his phone and delete his photo of the cows, before returning his device and ID card and releasing him around 6 p.m.
Idibia went straight to the office of the state police spokesperson, Mansur Hassan, and reported how he had been treated, Idibia and Maho said., adding that Hassan said the journalist’s claims would be investigated.
Idibia told CPJ that he received medical care at a local hospital, was using medication to treat his eye, and could not see clearly.
When CPJ contacted Hassan by phone, he requested questions been sent via text message but did not subsequently reply to those questions.
Editor’s note: This text has been updated throughout for clarity.