A petition calling for Nigeria Info FM presenter Ireti Bakare-Yusuf to be declared persona non grata in South Africa has surfaced online, promoted by an individual, Kgahliso Mokalapa.
It accuses Bakare-Yusuf of spreading misinformation about South Africa and promoting hostility toward the country through her reporting.
The organisers are urging supporters to sign the petition and contribute financially to the campaign.
The petition offers no specific allegations against her and no evidence linking her to the claims being made, leaving open the question of why her image was attached to it at all.
The mismatch between the petition's stated target and the face used to promote it has fuelled concern that Bakare-Yusuf, a vocal and consistently critical voice on Nigeria-South Africa relations, is being deliberately drawn into a harassment campaign at a moment of heightened tension between the two countries over xenophobic violence and the mass evacuation of Nigerian nationals from South Africa.
Bakare-Yusuf's Reporting
Bakare-Yusuf, who hosts Nigeria Info's Borderlines programme and founded the #NoMore movement, has built a reputation over recent months for confronting South African authorities directly over their treatment of Nigerians and other African migrants.
In one widely circulated exchange, she pressed South Africa's Justice Minister, Mmamoloko Kubayi, at an Inter-Ministerial Committee on Migration briefing in Pretoria, over remarks by a Cabinet colleague, Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, who had linked Nigerians to "drug dens" while responding to Nigeria's demand for compensation over property lost in anti-migrant violence.
Bakare-Yusuf noted that Nigerians in South Africa work as doctors, lawyers and other professionals, and asked directly whether an apology would be forthcoming.
An official approached her afterward and threatened to have her removed from the briefing room; no apology was given.
She has also pushed back on South African commentators who downplay Afrophobia against Nigerians and other African nationals, notably challenging author and activist Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma on Borderlines.
Her reporting has extended to the human toll of the crisis: she has described undocumented Nigerians trapped by South African law, unable to leave voluntarily without risking arrest.
She has also personally witnessed Nigerian families, including women and children, sleeping outside the Nigerian High Commission in Pretoria while awaiting evacuation flights.
Off the back of that reporting, she has publicly urged President Bola Tinubu to negotiate directly with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa for an amnesty that would let undocumented Nigerians return home without fear of arrest.
Petition Raises Safety Concerns
Because the campaign pairs Bakare-Yusuf's photograph with an explicit call to have her banned, without substantiating any allegation against her, it is raising fears as the kind of targeted online campaign that can expose journalists to real-world harassment, travel restrictions or intimidation.
Coming amid already strained Nigeria-South Africa relations over the recent wave of xenophobic attacks and the government's evacuation of nearly 1,500 Nigerians, the episode has heightened concern about outspoken reporters covering the crisis becoming targets themselves.
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