Don Tasks Media On Democracy

A political scientist, Prof.
Adigun Agbaje, on Wednesday in Abuja, advised media practitioners to see contentious issues surrounding elections as opportunities to strengthen Nigeria’s democracy.
Agbaje of the Department of Political Science, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, gave the advice while delivering a lecture entitled “Media and Electoral Reportage in Nigeria: An Assessment of Professional and Ethical Issues’’.
The lecture was organised by The Electoral Institute owned by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Agabje said that there was no doubt that dictates of professional and ethical requirements for reporting elections supportive of democracy and credible election would remain contentious in the future.
“We should see such contentious issues as opportunity to fashion out for the country a professional and ethical framework that suits the requirements of its media industry, including new media.
“It should suit the media industry in order for it to facilitate required election and other forms of reportage conducive to the blossoming of democracy,’’ he said.
The don added that within the framework must be located lessons learned since the 1980s, which increased certification in the form of higher education for media professionals.
He listed some of the prerequisites for better professionalism and ethical behaviour in the media to include a mixture of hands-on-training and exposure with knowledge gained in class room situations.
Others, according to him, include sustaining and deepening current stage of media diversity and strengthening the application of media technologies.
Agbaje said that this must be done in manners that devolved power and awareness to the grassroots and promoted democratic engagement “of and with the people’’.
He advised journalists and media managers to strictly adhere to the codes and ethics guiding their profession in the course of carrying out their duties.
These, he said, covered editorial independence, accuracy and fairness, privacy, decency, discrimination, reward and gratification, violence, public interest, among others.