The Punch newspaper has threatened to sue Vanguard newspaper, the SUN and Thisday over a fake advertorial published on different days by the newspapers.
Punch has given the newspapers 5 days to tender a public apology and publish it prominently in their respective newspapers or face litigation.
Here’s the genesis of the problem: A faceless group known as ‘Agents for Collective Transparency”, an anti-Jonathan group, photoshopped the cover pages of Punch newspapers and put copies of the pictures in advert form and gave Thisday, Sun & Vanguard to publish as advert, which the papers did.
Punch now says it has affected their integrity which is politically neutral. Also, the photoshopped headlines targeted against GEJ were never published in the real Punch newspaper, they were all fake stories. The affected newspapers are yet to react.