"If You Pay Nigerian Journalists Well, They Will Report The Goodness Of Satan"------Nnamdi Kanu

 "If You Pay Nigerian Journalists Well, They Will Report The Goodness Of Satan"------Nnamdi Kanu                                  ...

 "If You Pay Nigerian Journalists Well, They Will Report The Goodness Of Satan"------Nnamdi Kanu

                                                                                   

Mazi Nnamdi Kanu

Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, director of Radio Biafra and leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), on Tuesday 24th December 2019, indisputably stated the factual about the Nigerian journalists. He said: "if you pay Nigerian journalists well, they will report the goodness of Satan". This is the indeed the obvious and verifiable truth. They write only not to strongly put up a defense for the devil because of monetary gains but clearly epitomize character assassination, lies, wickedness, destruction, diabolism, fiendishness and naked sin. 

In Nigeria, professional journalism is dead as   "educated" touts take it over to massage political interests. This is a country where media practice be it electronic or print, break the news before carrying out investigation. In most cases, story contents are distorted by compromised bloggers to suit the cravings of politicians, thereby attracting undue traffic. Toxic information are daily being dished out to the unsuspecting reading public. With the trend of tainted news reportage, it is right to say that journalism in Nigeria has sent helpless citizens to their early graves more than Boko Haram terrorists or Fulani killer herdsmen who blatantly brandish different weapons of mass destruction.

According to Andrew Ali Ibbi, "knowing what is and is not 'news' crafting this 'news' into a 'story', (a peculiarly medium), specific, constrained format which demands not only training but lots of practice to master; and a tone of address which aims the information at the audience, a particular media channel, imagines itself to be speaking to/writing for. 

There is also a moral claim to be disinterested and dispassionate, and to be working on behalf of the public, a claim known as "objectivity", which gives the operation of journalism amoral imperative that can be welded to weed out particular type of knowledge the journalists or editors consider unfamiliar, high brow, arcane, partisan, irrational and dangerous for their reading audience. 

As a result,  journalists operate not simply as conduits that disseminate information but as specialists who determine which information is public-worthy and shapens such into particular forms of dissemination. It therefore means that journalists have the power to police boundaries within their domain and equally protect their autonomy as specialists in particular knowledge areas and practices". But in Nigeria, journalists gravely lack these values. Roy Thompson stated: "I do not believe that a newspaper can be run properly unless it's editorial columns are run freely and independently by a highly skilled and dedicated professional journalist". But because most of the Nigerian journalists have soiled their hands with blood, this tenet cannot be maintained. 

The National Television Authority (NTA) and the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN), have unfortunately been turned to sheer praise singers, shamelessly and limitlessly watercoloring the government of the day with bright colors. Cases abound where Nigerian journalists lost their jobs for going against the dictates of their paymasters. There are also incidents where the government has impounded daily publications of a handful of national dailies at circulation points through the machinery of armed military personnel just because of perceived contents deemed offensive to vested interests. Newspaper houses in Nigeria have same poor mental attitude of trying to render grossly unethical information occasioned by undue pressures from media organization owners, politicians and societal money bags. These influence stories in their favor not minding poor welfare packages. Nigerian journalists have consistently grappled with tempting inducements that have always had negative contentions with ethical judgements.

Journalism in Nigeria presently, is experiencing deep crisis of trustworthiness and integrity. This results from individual, organisational, environmental and societal challenges. Most of the cherished norms and values of journalism have been abused, violated, desecrated and debased. A return to recommended traditional standards of truthfulness and neutrality are just the only remedy to the lost glory. The persistent rude, biased, character assassination indices attached, are the reasons why some top politicians, the Nigerian police and army get emboldened to abduct, detain and torture, and go scott free in their human rights abuses. 

The media houses have been greatly compromised. Nobody can really tell how much the persecuted Sowore and Deji were paid to write junks about the IPOB leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and the Biafra struggle, the way they did. What goes around really comes around. They can clearly tell the story of what they eventually went through in the hands of the same Nigerian government. This is the reason why various media organisations and other professional bodies like the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), the Nigerian Press Council (NPC) and the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE) should synergize and fashion out ways to strengthen the values of journalism as an ethical profession, to bring back the glory for the salvation of Africans from this disgusting mess.

Written by Obulose Chidiebere N.

Edited by Peter Oshagwu

For Family Writers Press International