WORLD PRESS FREEDOM DAY – A RE-ASSESSMENT OF CONCEPT AND CELEBRATION, INTERPRETATION OF MEANING AND SOME THOUGHTS ON PRESS FREEDOM GOING FORWARD FOR US IN NIGERIA,
Being the text of a paper by veteran Journalist, Tony Abolo on World press freedom day May 3, 2015.
On the occasion of the 2015 WORLD PRESS FREEDOM DAY whose theme is:
Let Journalism Thrive! Towards Better Reporting, Gender Equality and Safety in the Digital Age,
I would want in this paper to make a re-assessment of the concept of Press Freedom, what this celebration should mean, provide some interpretations of meaning and contextualize the celebration and concepts by putting forward some thoughts on PRESS Freedom as an abiding principle going forward for us all in the profession and for the Nigerian nation.
What could be the ordinary as well as professional meaning of Press Freedom? We all recall painfully how the Freedom of Information Act took a long time to pass.
In some cases, Legislators and Lawyers felt we were asking for a special clause and safeguards other than the enshrined Freedom to receive and impart information, freedom of access, the Right to Free Speech and the basic citizen’s RIGHT TO KNOW.
In its intendment, Press Freedom means the right of the professional journalist to seek and ferret out basic information about society, about its structures, about its governance, about consequences of policy actions and to pass on same to the general public for the common good.
The idea and benefit of THE COMMON GOOD made the French philosopher, Montesquieu to argue that publicity and openness provide the best protection against tyranny, corruption and the excesses of arbitrary rule. And we, even today, are not far from such circumstances.
A free, independent and active media is essential in a democracy. To underscore the essential link between Media, Democracy and Development, a Mass Communication expert, Dennis Mcquail did say:
“It has been largely up to the Press to ensure that voters are well informed and capable of actively participating in public life, to subject politicians and governments to scrutiny and evaluation and to express public feelings and provide a platform of ideas”
And speaking of ideas, it is ideas that form the matrix with which society can re-make and retool itself.
Our role is to provide leading ideas, by enabling society to constantly think outside the box, through the rigour of intellect.
It is also our role to make explicit, what is implicit by unbundling confusing ideas and thoughts and provide articulate public understanding of complex social issues.
It is our role to make the public aware, and that public includes, the government itself, of public discontents, fears, suspicious and anxieties and force governments to rectify errors.
No one then, in an open and democratic society, cannot but say, that Press Freedom is a valuable contribution to the asset and dynamics of growth in any such society.
It is an ideal that should be upheld and that is why in practice, we all must want always to look at the bigger societal picture and get ALL the perspectives, in order to always have “the inside story”.
A true journalist is a permanent researcher, by utilizing the 5 Ws and H. We are forever investigating in order to tell our stories.
Whether it is “history in a hurry,” as Dele Giwa would describe it, or a feature or a documentary series, it is always a researching endeavour.
What are we always researching for? And this is important, as we tend to lose sight of our core reason for professional existence.
We are researching not just to tell a story – but, to tell the TRUTH. It is in this irreducible level of professional service delivery that many journalists in Nigeria fail, if we may borrow the Rotarians language – the FOUR WAY TEST or professionally speaking, the FAIRNESS DOCTRINE and in the corollary of the fairness doctrine which is accuracy, fairness and completeness in the sustenance and service of the citizens and communities.
Do we hear from all sides? Do we ascertain the veracity and authenticity of what was said or heard?
Do we present a balanced story, always? Can the public always trust our headlines? Do we do cash for stories and present hear says, as stories?
This is what a blogger had to write just about a week ago on line about the Nigerian journalists:
“It is one thing to write an editorial opinion and it is another to call fiction or conjecture “facts” from unknown sources or gotten from sources too petrified to have their names in print.
“In civilized countries, where journalists say their sources are “deep throat” of the Watergate scandal type, there is always a face and a body at the end of such info.
“Nigerian reporters have turned a genuine journalistic tool into a 419. Their sources even at a political rally are always, some source that is so afraid and wanted, no publicity”
Com’mon.
The issues of Truth, Veracity and Authenticity brings to the fore, not only a major concern in this year’s World Press Freedom Day theme – TOWARDS BETTER REPORTING but also complaints from older and senior journalists as well as media Academicians.
If you have not heard it, let me say it – loud and clear. A lot of what passes on as comments and opinions in our media are highly self opinionated, jaundiced, biased and bigoted views, contrary to the laid down and correct procedure of dealing with fact.
Facts, we always maintain, are sacred. They are sacred, not because they are facts, but because the facts are verified truth.
(I gladly would recommend everyone should read Sonala Olumwense on Sunday, August 21, 2011, page 61 of the Guardian, under the title – Putting the Bite BACK IN NIGERIAN JOURNALISM. I would just take some excerpts just to make the point.
“Much of today’s reporting is governed by what is said, as opposed to what is done… this is the easiest form of reporting; there is no work involved… I call it rhetoric recycling”.
“Why does our mass media refuse to ask questions? When Journalists do not ask key questions or write key stories… they achieve the effect of muzzling the people”
“Finally, there is the editorial commentary, the third component of journalism toolkit that is in such disrepair in Nigeria… what is happening in Nigeria and one of the reasons why the editorial comment is generally being ignored, it that it is being written for purposes of fashion, not function…. In most newspapers, the editorial comment appears as a long and tedious space filler. It is being written to fill an allotted space”
It is extremely sobering to read Sonala’s column. And still on Editorials, it is established that an editorial not only takes a house policy stand based on its stated values but the arguments are usually researched, well written, very logical and so weighty that they produce policy changes and reversals.
You may then wonder why our media hardly has deep or any influence at all on our public policies and public behavior.
The respect and influence that the media has is because, it speaks the truth, without equivocation and speaks powerfully and forcefully to authority as well as to the public.
If then our journalism must thrive, we must strive towards Better Reporting and quality Editorial writing.
Luckily, our immediate future beckons. And here, I would quote the three popular expectations.
FIRST, the President-Elect, General Muhammadu Buhari, who on April 25th 2015 said these words at the 2015 Biennial Convention of the Guild of Editors:
“The work of the Press is not over. The incoming Administration would like the Press to continue its role of watchmen and women, aggregating the views and positions of the people on national issues and presenting these as lucidly as possible through publication and other channels to the government to guide it on the onerous task of providing good governance for our people.
“Nigeria is a huge country and no government can be able to know all that is happening across the length and breadth of the country without the assistance of the media…
“There is no modern society or government that can neglect the press or can function without a vibrant media.
“Thus the press plays a very important role in all modern states especially in democracies.
“And as more and more states strive towards improving popular participation in government, the role of the press can only but expand thereby conferring more influence and responsibility on the Editors, and their Guilds or Association”.
Then comes Olusegun Oshinowo, the Director General of Nigeria Employers Consultative Association (NECA) who as reported in the “Business on Sunday” of April 19th 2015, while decrying the lack of action by Federal Lawmakers in dealing with alleged corruption in the parliament with regards to its secretive handling of Audit reports sent to it by the Auditor General of the Federation is hinging his hope for an accelerated hearing on its request based the FOI Act and on Buhari.
In the report (page 3, How Audit Indictees Bribe Lawmakers to Mask Findings) Oshinowo is quoted saying:
“Ordinarily, if the National Assembly could say it might not want to make known to the public the outcome of such findings, the appointed arm of government that has the responsibility should be bold enough to make known to the public the outcome of such findings.
“The F.O.I. Law should be able to get the Press to be able to lay hands on some of the audit reports and make noise about it…..
The Press as a matter of law can demand for the outcome of any audit report.
“I cannot expect the EFCC to jump on the train. It has to come based on series of cogent information….. the EFCC would have no reason not to act after such information.
“Given the antecedent of the President – elect, we can say it is a new dawn in Nigeria.”
While then both the incoming government as well as the public have high hopes about our roles, there are two important caveats.
The first is that the more open and honest the government is with the people, the higher the degree of public confidence in government and its communications.
The second and this for me is a serious one. As expressed by Julian Assange, the Wiki-Leaks whistle blower:
“Media organizations by their very nature are engaged in the political sphere.
“(The danger is) that once the media grows to a sufficient size and has sufficient influence, (it) starts to make political compromises.
“(And so) the editors and publishers of media organizations (begin) to sit down at the table with power groups and they start becoming captured by these power groups,” Julian Assange, Weekly Trust, April 21, 2012 p. 52.
It is to this second caveat that I would want us to address our minds very seriously in Nigeria.
With a Contractor Publisher and Business minded Electronic Media owner class, sitting down with big Business and government functionaries and with the ordinary workaday journalists over fraternizing with those in government, can we safely not say that the dangers of politically being compromised are always present?
Can we not go back to the old relationship model, which was – seek information from government functionaries but keep the relationship professional and at arms length.
The NUJ must decide for itself what it defines as being a Trade Union and yet being a professional body. The blurred lines in Nigeria, creates a convoluted balance.
Then is the over dependence sometimes on government. Can we safely then be an ombudsman, a body professional enough to act, fair to all manner of persons? Or are we a two faced Janus?
This brings me to the all important question as to whether we in the media realize the history and the real reasons why we are called – the Fourth Estate of the Realm, or what our dear Tony Momoh would refer to as, a power within the Quadrangle of power.
People come into this profession without realizing the power we have and of course concomitantly, the responsibility there on to.
In history, when the monarchies and their authoritarian holds were being rolled back to pave way for a new structure of authority.
The people insisted on participation and representation. This led to an Assembly that was eventually to be, a Parliament.
With constant bickering between the people, the parliament and the monarch, adjudication became necessary leading to the evolution of the judiciary.
With more Enlightenment, and the discovery of printing, the early need for general information dispersal naturally led to what the people felt was necessary for a proper check and balance through a citizenry sense of participation through adequate information.
This was to lead to the enlightened view of an important social institution, the Press, as the FOURTH ESTATE OF THE REALM.
It was this social power relationship that we inherited which is guaranteed in our constitution, section 22 which as set out in the 1999 constitution (and as amended) reads –
“The Press, Radio, Television and other agencies of the Mass Media shall at all times be free to uphold the fundamental objectives in this chapter and uphold the responsibility and accountability of the government to the people.”
As you have heard, that has written the profession into the power structure of the state, which in a quadrangle of equal relationship of roles for the benefit of society, we are in it, alongside the Executive, the Legislature, the Judiciary and then, we, the Media.
If only we realize that we have power and that we have role expectations. It is not a subservient role but that of complementarity.
This has been built upon further in the Freedom of Information Act – which is
“To provide, as of right, free and uninhibited access to public
information or records kept by Government, public institutions and/or private organizations carrying out public functions for citizens and non-citizens of the country, provided such information or records are not injurious to the conduct of international affairs and the defense of Nigeria, do not jeopardize law enforcement and investigation and do not affect the economic interest of the country”.
Speaking stoutly in defense of the Freedom of Information Act, Senator Victor Ndoma – Egba would say:“You cannot enthrone participatory democracy, accountable governance without openness in public affairs.
A society which guarantees access to information elevates public discourse and therefore facilitates the fight against corruption”. ( )
So we have the tools. Then what is holding us back on our rights and Freedom?
First it must be the political system. It is a well known maxim of the media by leading media scholars that the mass media always takes on the form and coloration of the social and political structures within which they operate.
It is only natural for the media to reflect the system of social control in which relations between individuals and institutions are adjusted.
Tentative explanations of the different systems have been offered but the 1956 treatise by Frederick Siebert, Theodore Peterson and Wilbur Schramm titled – the Four Theories of the Press has remained the most durable.
The authors have demonstrated that the media operate under two general philosophical modes – authoritarianism and libertarianism or their respective offshoots (Communism and Social responsibility).
However in the developing countries such as ours, the appropriate system encouraged is Developmental as this would be more suitable to guide the political elite to find their way to evolving good governance.
This mode is all the more important for two major reasons. Importantly at the surface, we are under the illusion that our political system in Nigeria, is a democracy, which it is not.
The behavior of those in governance is simply authoritarian. They brook no indictments, no negative criticisms, no public opprobrium.
All they want is PR, ego massaging and propagandish media. It all has to do with the personality development of those in governance.
Many have inferiority complexes and are not yet developed into confident, self assured personalities who would rather reason than be emotive on issues and reacting to every content of media reportage .
So, it is a personality factor. The recent brush between, AIT and the President – Elect Defense House handlers is but an example.
Then secondly, we in the media are not sufficiently nurtured in genuine AFRICAN KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS that is robust enough to lead us to have Afro-centric thoughts.
We are confused about the world and world systems. Without sounding redundant and banal, We are not Americans, We are not British, we are not Russians, We are not Chinese. We are Africans. Many in the media business are yet to realize the damage of colonialism in the indoctrination of our people’s minds and so, we have not been able to resolve the issue of vision.
We all need to go back to our past, our collective past, as Nigeria is an admixture of ethnic nations in order to find original solutions for the future.
It is in this context that we can find media freedom in the context of developmental journalism practiced with a social responsibility conscience.
We need a new media language and culture like, in the confusion and contradictions that produced, Iwe Irohin Yoruba in 1857 and the Lagos and Abeokuta conversations in the early 18th century.
And so going forward, how can we capture the Freedoms we all are desirous of in the task of nation building, good governance and societal advancement, for that is the reason for journalism.
We all need to get back to the basics, – the basic rules of fair hearing as espoused in the Fairness Doctrine.
In our haste for sensation and sometimes allowing ourselves to be compromised we became pre-judicial in our comments and reports.
Now that impinges on media credibility. Those in the know are beginning to doubt the media.
Where cash for news is the norm and News on Television and Radio is paid for – where is the integrity of media?
What we do is essentially not different from what the BBC or CNN does. If I may ask. Do you pay BBC or CCN to go to NEPAL to cover the earthquake devastation or go into Boko Haram territories? Our media model is wrong.
From content analysis point of view, how much coverage do women and women affairs get in the news or programmes?
Extremely insignificant attention. Now that is not development journalism. The African Women Leadership Organisation Conference which began in 2009 shows us an admirable model which states that women and girls are Africa’s greatest untapped resource.
The United Nations agrees and says that, expanding the freedoms, education and opportunities for women holds the key to kick-starting inclusive economic growth.
We in the media must change our emphasis and tilt the balance, as society only improves by being gender sensitive and gender inclusiveness.
Perhaps we are deepening the bias against women by constantly referring to ourselves as “Gentlemen of the Press” – as if it is an exclusive preserve of men. No nation can succeed like Abiola did say, by clapping with one hand.
We need at all strata of this profession, women practitioners. The days of May Ellen Ezekiel and Dr. Doyin Abiola seem so far away. Should our women not become the Christine Amanpours of our Media too?
With the twitter handle, BBM and facebook so within the reach of citizen journalists, we are faced with multiple opportunities for news sourcing and outreach but at the same time, at a cusp of vile and false news that have no authentication.
Incidentally to confront this challenge in this age of digital journalism, I have asked a student to research and develop a software that can act like the system developed in Israel for Pay Pal.
The software can identify credible customers, and provides Pay Pal webs alternative to checques and credit cards.
Pay Pal is the largest internet payment system in the world. They have a solution to the problem of online payment scams, credit card fraud and electronic identity theft.
But there in the cyberspace, anonymity cannot enable us authenticate a story source and its veracity.
A software such as I propose and envisage would provide the rigorous safety such as we have and do apply in the traditional media.
Then there is another core issue in this year’s theme, Safety in the Digital age. The social media is upon us.
And the current challenge of Boko Haram in Nigeria is a case in point. Their new found relationship with ISIS and an Islamic caliphate in Nigeria is a present danger.
Despite the storming of Sambisa forest and the reclamation of 11 local governments out of 14 in the North East, we may be entering a new phase of the war.
For when the identified battle fronts cease and it becomes a guerilla war, the challenge will then be, to battle them in their use of social media and their propaganda war machinery.
We are as yet unable to identify the Boko Haram sponsors in and to Nigeria. We see pictures of their weapons.
From where do these weapons come from and through which routes? And when their weaponry and Hilux vans build up, how come the security forces are unable to have the speediest intelligence on counter terrorism?
Above all, for us in the media, we are yet to make a special enquiry as to the dynamics of the ideology that radicalizes young persons who are their foot soldiers in their quest for an Islamic caliphate and those young tender girls who do the suicide bombings.
The social media is the avenue for recruitment and the u-tube is where we all derive footages of their escapades.
The international community is hardly capable of containing their onslaught and advances. For us, we need to think of social media counter measures to change the language and context of radicalization.
Growing up on the media beat, just as many of you, we were used to such words as “SCOOPS” and “Exclusive”.
These days, not any more. These have been replaced with professional laziness and “send it into my box” requests.
What made a journalist then and earned him respect as well, were the “Scoops” and “Exclusives”.
Today the sameness of style, the story lines and the stories themselves are making us bland and no more an exclusive band of professionals.
We need to regain our freedom to speak, to report and dominate the public space and earn the respect of society and those in authority.
We must regain our space of authority and freedom, by being ethical and faithful to our calling such that we seek the truth always and ask questions of those in authority; questions they may not want to answer but which our readers, viewers and listeners want answers.
That is when Press Freedom makes sense. It is then that we can stand up against over bearing, over meddling and arrogant persons in authority.
That is when, when people ask, why Press Freedom? You can rightly say, the society is better for truth, and for the varied views and perspectives we all threw up.
Let a thousand flowers blossom, the Chinese would say. The society is enabled and enobled with the big bold ideas and information which the Freedom of the Press provides.
Tony Abolo
3-05-15
Benin City.
