The Executive Director, Institute for Media and Society, (IMS), Dr. Akin Akingbulu, has said that his organisation had prepared a memoradum before the National Assembly to sanction anyone who violates the rights of journalists in the cause of reporting election and such a person should be prosecuted.
Akingbulu made the disclosure on Wednesday in Lagos at the media stakeholders meeting and public presentation of publications on research work he carried out on broadcast media in Nigeria.
He said they prepared the memoradum as a result of the reform process on media going at the National Assembly, as part of the reform, anyone who violate the rights of journalist would be penalized and pay dearly for it. Also the institution to which such journalists belongs had to be responsible for compensation for violating the right of such journalists, those are the things we are pushing for, all these are for the betterment of journalists.
“These are what we want to do so that journalists would be able to work in a friendly atmosphere without harassment and intimidation. The research we carried out and monitored on media houses for eighteen months the analysis of the data we gathered, the broadcast media gave us 5.2 percent of the coverage of people living with disability, that’s close to nothing.
“What we are trying to do now is to work on capacity building from various constituency, journalist should be passionate about reporting the vulnerable well so that when it come to election period, because this particular people will be reached. We are also mobilising stakeholders to come up with strategies we would put in place so that vulnerable would have adequate representation.”
He added that, the National Broadcasting Corporation should be able to perform more than what they are doing presently. For over three years we have been working with them in capacity building for their staffs. Presently, they are putting on memoradum to look at the area of licensing and other issues, the memoradum would be unveiled very soon.
Meanwhile, the Director, National Orientation Agency,( NOA) Lagos, Mr. Waheed Ishola, said said media has important role to play in nation building.
He said NOA had organised several peace meeting with the youths across the country, specifically, a lot of advocacy had been done in Lagos. What we need do now is to educate the youths more through all media platforms about the danger associated with violence.
“This forum is to develop the capacity of media practitioner, which NOA is not exceptional, because the event is meant for us to rob minds on important issues that are affecting the media and the enably laws guarding the media, we are in full support of what they are doing which will depend the reportage of our democratic governance in Nigeria.”
