Date Published: 10/24/09

Daily Times of Nigeria and the new face of fraud-An open letter!

Fidelis Anosike, DTN Chairman

I write this letter with tears in my eyes at the realization of all the corruption, mismanagement and further destruction of a national monument as large as The Daily Times of Nigeria.   The oldest newspaper on the continent, with such a strong history of integrity is just being turned into a platform to scam people who still believe in its old values.

All the buzz words used such as reviving, rebuilding, resuscitate are all merely words used in a game to bring the best master minds together to make it look like the owners Folio Communications, with Fidelis Anosike at its leadership are actually trying to do something but all the while are only interested in robbery.

The Daily Times of Nigeria has only been used as a mask by Folio Communications to defraud innocent people who want to make a better change to the face of journalism in Nigeria.

What further saddens me is the fact that we all seem to be sitting back and watching all of this happen in silence.  What is it? Are we paralyzed to talk? Or is it this nonchalant attitude that seems to be sweeping us away? Or are we just simply not aware of what is going on? Should it be a case of a lack of information, please note the following: Folio Communications with Fidelis Anosike as its chairman controversially bought The Daily Times of Nigeria (DTN) five years ago and what do they have to show for it?

A. 6 Managing Directors in 5 years.

B. Nonpayment of salaries.  There is not one single person that has been engaged by The Daily Times of Nigeria with Fidelis Anosike at its leadership that is not owed money.  This disquieting list ranges from drivers, journalists, sales team, office executives, hotels, marketers, graphic designers, printers, cleaning services, and advertising agencies.  Please observe that this list is not restricted to Nigeria alone but cuts across South Africa, the United Kingdom, and Europe.

C. Folio Communications under the leadership of Fidelis Anosike used The Daily Times of Nigeria to take over 700,000,000m Naira in bank loans under the false pretense of paying salaries. This money sorrowfully was never used to benefit DTN. There was always extra for a regular bottle of Dom Perignon for its Chairman Fidelis Anosike at nightclubs on Fridays and high priced prostitutes as trophies.

D. Fidelis Anosike as chairman of DTN has managed to quarrel with every single executive, managing director, accountant, financial consultant, and human resource manager that have been hired at DTN and this always resulted in a speedy resignation each time.

E. The Daily Times of Nigeria with Fidelis Anosike at its helm has sold key properties in Nigeria and London.

F. Fidelis Anosike craftily, used a publication called 1st.October to collect large sums of money from the state governments and private sector but did not honor any of its agreements to the states or its executives and journalists.  They promised subscribers that they would receive 100 copies complementary, they promised subscribers that the book would be distributed all over the world, they promised subscribers that they would print over 50,000 copies and not a single promise has been met till date after pocketing millions of Naira in profit.

G. The South African Company that Fidelis Anosike contracted to put the production of 1st.October together from start to finish was not paid anything after he collected over 400,000 000m Naira in profit as a result of all the hard work and efforts the company put in.

H. The supposing printing press that Fidelis Anosike is proudly talking about worth 5million Euros is just another scam to try and collect more loans from the banks, private investors and to try and deceive the Bureau of Public Enterprises into believing that he is actually trying to revive the company.

I. The emotional and sexual harassment-taking place in the company is alarming.    Fidelis Anosike and his team bring in female employees from other countries, and then they make sexual advances at them and if they do not respond he does not pay them salaries and leaves them stranded in Nigeria because he believes as foreigners they do not have rights.

J. Constant verbal and physical abuse of staff.

K. Illegal alteration of contracts of employment, reducing salaries and benefits.

L. No governance structure. Absolutely no financial transparency, absolutely no corporate structure.  Fidelis Anosike the chairman, at any given time will change an employee’s job title and description and decide at his own judgment whether to pay them or not.

Here are all the facts of what is going on with one of Nigeria’s largest monuments The Daily Times of Nigeria.

This letter is a cry for help for all the people whose human rights have been grossly violated at The Daily Times of Nigeria under the leadership of Fidelis Anosike. This is a cry for help for all the honorable families that lost their homes because they could not afford to pay rent whilst working at The Daily Times of Nigeria under the leadership of Fidelis Anosike.  This is a cry for help for all the foreigners that came to work for The Daily Times of Nigeria because of what it used to stand for and found themselves victims of sexual assault.  This is a cry for help for all the families that could not eat at night whilst working for The Daily Times of Nigeria, under the leadership of Fidelis Anosike because they were never paid their salaries for months on end whilst he continued to drive around town in flashy cars and take expensive holidays with his girlfriends.

This is a cry for help!

By a concerned staff