Ephraim Emeka Ugwuonye Esq.
Published on Tuesday, 07 January 2014 16:50
Written by Ephraim Ugwuonye
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In the report below, in in which Sahara Reporters aimed its usual filth on the Nigerian Aviation, Ms. Stella Oduah, one can see how Sahara Reporting works. On the surface, you would think that there is a compelling story that is watertight. But not really. Before I say anything further, let me make it clear that I don't work for this woman.
I don't know who she is. She will not give me water if I appear in her office tomorrow. I would say, I care very little about her personally. But, I can educate the average person on how SR uses fact manipulation to play on the minds of an average person and extort money from victims or be paid by those that aim to attack the victim. 
The whole story is based on the claim that: (a) Ms. Oduah claimed to have obtained MBA from the Virginia College. If one can show that she never made that claim, everything else Sahara Reporters wrote will fall like a pack of cards. Right?
First, how do you know that she ever claimed to have MBA from that college? Or are you going to blame her for what Sun Newspaper reported? Maybe! But not so fast!
Let's start from what we know or what we could verify: We can verify whether the particular college ever offered MBA or not. It doesn’t. But that is not the issue. 
Then, let's verify whether the lady claimed (a) that she got MBA and (b) that she obtained it from that college. SR says she did (a) and (b). What is SR's proof? (a) SR says that she stated that in her resume which she allegedly submitted to the Senate for her confirmation hearing. (b) SR says that Sun Newspapers claimed she had an MBA from that college.  
What SR did is an old trick. You create a straw man, and then you shoot him down and pose like a hero that slayed the dragon. Remember what a mother normally does with 2-year old kids. She would point in the corner of the room at an imaginary boogieman. The child will be captivated by the supposed boogieman. Then the mother will take any object nearby and strike at the boogieman. The child will smile to see his brave mother slay the boogieman. That is what SR has done in this report. It created scenarios that were not important and made them look like something hidden that it, the crusader, alone discovered.
Question: What is the proof that Oduah made that claim on the resume she submitted to the Senate? There is no proof provided. For you to dispense with proof, you have to believe SR to be saying the truth. But SR CANNOT be trusted to say the truth about this woman. Why? Read the entire report again. It is clear that SR credits itself with "outing" this woman for corruption. Yet it was known that SR embellished that report it wrote on the Minister in October of last year. So, the reader must go beyond SR to find the truth.
If SR had a copy of the resume of this woman, which it alleges was presented to the Senate, it would normally have exhibited that resume. It is fair to say therefore that SR does not have a copy of that resume. It must be reporting on what it was told by an unnamed person, or better, what its publisher cooked up. 
Secondly, if the resume was submited to the Senate, it would be part of the official documents of the Senate and SR could have obtained a Certified True Copy of what the Senate has in its record. That way, the truth would be clear. But it did not, because it doesn’t exist.
So, the point is that this story that appears to be a bull’s-eye or something big could really be a patched up set of fabrications. 
Before you get carried away by this story, consider the following:
(a) That this woman did not make the claims in any resume contrary to what SR has alleged.
(b) That this woman is not ordinarily responsible for what Sun Newspaper might thane written.
(c) That there is no other occasion where this woman is said to have made the same claim. In her recent appearance before the House of Representative in November of 2013, she fully described her educational background and there was no claim about the MBA from the Virginia College. So, how come that she wrote her resume for only one occasion?
(d) That SR might have been on a vendetta against this woman, not as a journalist reporting facts as they occurred, but as a propagandist shaping those facts to arrive at an agenda.
(d) That this woman has enemies that could have bought SR to peddle these fabrications. And SR has previously been known to lie and fabricate stories based on who paid for such fabrication.
(e) That, indeed, if you look closely at what Sahara Reporters wrote, you would see vividly the trick. SR wrote in its own words as follows:
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“[Oduah] realized very early in life the indispensability of a sound education in her growth plans in life and therefore pursued her education with all diligence and sense of purpose,” her documents claimed, adding that a determination “to have the best education at the highest level” prompted her stay at the Virginia college in 1983 for the MBA programme.
The above is the story of SR. SR presented the statement above as if it all was something that Mr. Oduah said or wrote. But look at the above statement again carefully. What do you notice? Not all of it was in quotation mark. The quoted part are supposed to be her statement. The portion that is not quoted were supplied by SR. 
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A realistic look at the above statement would show that:
Oduah said: “[Oduah] realized very early in life the indispensability of a sound education in her growth plans in life and therefore pursued her education with all diligence and sense of purpose,”  ……..“to have the best education at the highest level” 
______________
The following part of that statement above was supplied by SR:
SR added: [her documents claimed, adding that a determination]….. [prompted her stay at the Virginia College in 1983 for the MBA programme.].
If you examine the above, you would see that it was SR that added “MBA from Virginia” to Oduah’s resume statement.
Further, if you look at even the statement in quote, supposedly written by Oduah, it has a phrase such as “…pursued her education…”. The “her” in that statement means that it might not have been written by Oduah herself. Otherwise, it would have been “my” instead of “her”.
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  Also, note the following statement by SR:
As her public relations machinery marched on, in December 2012 The Sun newspaper published an article headlined “Stella Oduah: An Amazon of transformation,” which lauded her “MBA from St Paul’s College, Lawrenceville Virginia USA.”  The story also praised her for being an official who brought her “rich educational background to bear on the aviation sector by automating revenue centers in all the agencies and parastatals to boost their revenue profile and enhance transparency and accountability in the system.”
What does SR mean by: “As her public relations machinery marched on..”? How did SR know that the story published in Sun Newspaper was not something written by Sun Newspaper journalists and reporters on their own? How did it become “her public relations machinery?” . And if SR was sure that it was not Sun Newspapers journalist that wrote that story, why didn’t SR mention the names of the people that comprised “her public relations machinery” since it knew what they were doing?
I bothered to point those few instances and pattern of manipulation of facts by SR. I know SR first hand. I know what it did in my case. Concealing a personal vendetta towards me, it lied one thousand times against me. It clamed that an American court found me guilty of stealing. It claimed that I was going to go to jail in America. It peddled such falsehood to the gullible members of the Nigerian public who bought it hook, line and sinker. It is peddling similar lies against this woman, hoping that the gullible Nigerians would buy it. What SR is not revealing to Nigerians is how much money it was paid to attack this woman. And one must have noticed how the SR publisher tries to blackmail the Nigerian Senate into investigating the story it fabricated. This is not journalism. This is gutter attempt to extort money from this Minister or to give value to those that paid SR to spread this propaganda.
US College Says It Did Not Award MBA To Stella Oduah As It Has No Masters Programme | Saharareporters
http://saharareporters.com/news-page/us-college-says-it-did-not-award-mba-stella-oduah-it-has-no-masters-programme
Please

She stays

Journalists must endeavour to inform the public rightly,they must stand out as the conscience of the nation,they shld grow above parochial interest,non-partisan and stand out as social engineers!They are the hope of the masses,even when other structures of governance goes wrong,every one looks up to them....what the press is doing right now in Nigeria is both pathetic and shameful!i just hope that after 2015 they may still ve a Nigeria to write about.

See analysis. SMH for SR.

Nice analysis....

What do you expect from gullible people who get deceived by uneducated clergy, quoting passages from the holy books out of context.
Do they even know how to read?

Calling on all APC urchins - here is an opportunity to justify your pay.

I took SR report with a pinch of salt, Sowore that I know is a master in the game of deceit, even as a student leader

When I see a report from Sahara reporters, I first of all pause, verify before commenting, cant afford to loose my credibilty because of SR.

She should just present her credentials to prove naysayers wrong, its not a big deal.

Bankole passed through the same thing when they said he didn't serve, and he produced pictures plus maybe his nysc certificate as evidence he did.

The above analysis can not justify or vindicate Oduah of her claims. Let her present the original credential

This is the reason why they want Stella Oduah dead: https://www.nairaland.com/1492522/reasons-why-stella-oduah-being

I'm not suprised. That is what you get when you set out to do hatchet job or witch-hunt people with "investigative journalism". They will continue to fumble, wobble and mess up themselves in the process. This must be investigative journalism naija style. Nonsense!

Our hardworking Stella Oduah should just ignore the clowns "investigating" her and continue her good works in the aviation sector. I'm sure she must be having a good laugh wherever she is now. Hmmm! Yeye dey smell!