On April 16, 2021, Frederick Olatunde Odimayo, a freelance reporter and editor with the privately-owned radio station, Grace FM, Lokoja in Kogi State, was beaten up until he lost consciousness by five persons suspected to be drug peddlers.
Frederick said he was accosted by the men while fixing his car at a car repair shop along Cemetery Road in Lokoja accusing him of destroying their drug trafficking business with his reporting. They proceeded to beat him for about 15 minutes, until one of the journalist’s colleagues intervened to stop the attack.
Frederick said his assailants alleged that the Radio Station had reported the sale of cannabis sativa, popularly called Indian hemp along cemetery road, their place of business, which they said was capable of affecting their business and patronage.
.He was thereafter taken to the hospital where he received treatment for the attack
