Popular Journalist, Fisayo Soyombo Regains Freedom

Popular Nigerian journalist, Fisayo Soyombo has been released by the Nigeria Police Force.

Naija News had earlier reported that the founder of the Foundation for Investigative Journalism (FIJ) was invited by the police over an ongoing investigation.

A statement by his media aide, Tolulope Abimbola, said the police actually invited Soyombo because of a story published by FIJ about a police camp project approved in 2018 and scheduled to be completed in 14 weeks.

The news platform had alleged that the Deputy Inspector-General of Police, Joseph Egbunike, joined other police chiefs to approve more than N1billion for sham police transit camps project in Benue, Bauchi, Plateau, Katsina and Kano State.

According to the report, Egbunike gave the approval in his former role as Commissioner of Police in charge of budget and finance at the Nigeria Police Force headquarters.

Abimbola disclosed that Egbunike had petitioned the police over the report, which led to Soyombo being grilled by the NPF.

In a post on its Twitter handle on Monday evening, FIJ said Soyombo was released by the police around 6pm on bail.

The news platform said its founder is set to return to the Force Headquarters on January 13, 2022.

The post reads: “We can confirm that our founder, Fisayo Soyombo, has been released by the Force Headquarters.

“He was released on bail at exactly 6:26om today and is to return on January 13, 2022. Our only offence here is that we published a true story.”