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PUNCH NEWSPAPER SACKS LONGEST-SERVING EDITOR OVER FATOYINBO

Afnews Editor

Jul 10, 2019

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Punch Newspaper has sacked its longest serving editor Martin Ayankola, following outrage over a controversial cartoon published last Thursday.

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Mr. Ayankola, who was appointed on December 2012, is the longest-serving editor in the 46 years history of The PUNCH.

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The newspaper had on July 4 published an article on its back page by Abimbola Adelakun with the title "What Does Mrs. Fatoyinbo Know".

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The article, which examined the rape allegations against Pastor Biodun Fatoyinbo of the Commonwealth of Zion Assembly (COZA) was illustrated with the cartoon of a man desecrating the bible with urine.

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Punch had apologised after the cartoon was greeted with backlash.

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An emergency meeting was convened by the board on Monday where Ayankola was directed to resign before the close of work.

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The editor had only returned from a one-week suspension before the cartoon saga.

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It is also suggested that the columnist and the chairman of the editorial board could be affected by the board's decision.

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It was learnt from inside sources that Punch management had been shopping for Ayankola's replacement for a while.

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Former editor of Sunday PUNCH, Toyosi Ogunseye, had been penciled down to take over in January 2019.

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Ms Ogunseye, who is the first female to be appointed editor in the media organisation, however, left in January 2018 to join the BBC as head of West Africa operations.

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Source:QED

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