Africa-Press – Gambia. A reporter with PRNigeria, Mohammed Dahiru Lawal has emerged as the overall Best Fellow in West Africa on the Dubawa, Premium Times Center for Investigative Journalism (PTCIJ) Kwame Kari Kari Fact-Checking and Research Fellowship 2021.
Dahiru clinched the award at the end of the six-month Fellowship programme during dinner and award night which was held at Millionaire Hall, Corinthia Villa Hotel Garki Abuja.
While announcing the award, the Editor of Dubawa – Nigeria’s first indigenous independent and most visible fact-checking platform in West Africa, Kemi Busari stated that the overall best fellow was selected based on the combination of outstanding fact-checking and conduct during the programme.
Dahiru had during the fellowship in July and September 2021 won the award for best fact-check of the month making him the only fellow on the programme who won fact-checker of the month twice while it lasted from May to November 2021.The Kwame Kari Kari Fact-Checking and Research Fellowship which included 19 graduating journalists from The Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone also awarded Lami Sadiq from Daily Trust Nigeria as runner up for the best fact-check and Michael Olatunbosun from Splash FM Oyo-Nigeria as a winner of the second runner up for best fact-check, while the best fact check award went to joint winners Elizabeth Ogunbamowo from Sahara Reporters Nigeria and Kizito Cudjoe from Ghana for their collaborative work on “Examining Buhari’s claim middlemen are responsible for rising food prices in Nigeria.”Now in its third year, the 2021 cohort started with 22 well-qualified journalists from Nigeria and other West African countries, representing major media platforms including Punch, Tribune, NTA, Legit among others.
Speaking on the award, the Publisher and Editor in Chief of PRNigeria, Yushau Shuaib, disclosed that, “beyond Public Relations and crisis communication, PRNigeria is proud in also leading in the field of investigative journalism and fact-checking which the latest award to one of our staff, Dahiru Lawal demonstrated.
“We will continue to inspire young communicators to develop interest in public relations and investigative journalism as weapons to fight fake news and hate speech through fact-checking and responsible reportage for national development.”
In his own reaction, Dahiru who recently graduated top three of his class in the Department of Information and Media Studies, Bayero University Kano expressed optimism that with fact-checking entrenched not only in newsrooms but inculcated in journalism practice the dignity of information dissemination will be restored and trust established between people and the media.
“Whether it’s fact-checking journalism, development or investigative journalism, this award has strengthened my resolve to continue practising this noble profession in a way that will always impact positively on the people,” he said.
A recipient of Campus Journalist of the Year 2020 and Author of 101 Fake News on EndSARS, Dahiru is now head of Fact-Checking Desk at Image Merchant Promotions Limited (IMPR), Publishers of PRNigeria and Economic Confidential. He is also Project Manager, Penlight Centre for New Media Innovation.
NITDA, NUJ Partner on Digital Journalism to Fight Fake News
In order to check quackery and the rising cases of fake news in the practice of journalism as well as provide eligible journalists with the latest technological tools with which they will carry out their jobs professionally and be at par with international best practices, the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) has given a nod to the proposed partnership sought by the national body of the fourth estate of the realm -the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ).
This was during a courtesy visit by members of the Union, led by its National President, Mr Chris Isiguzo.
The Director-General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Kashifu Inuwa CCIE, while emphasizing the relevance of emerging technologies in journalism, decried the adverse effect of fake news which he described as unimaginable and a huge threat to the profession.
“Today, anybody can be a journalist without knowing the journalistic ethics. So, how can we address that? We can only do that through this kind of engagement; by training and retraining because journalists need to understand that it is now about digital journalism and for you to engage in that, one needs to understand the technology and be able to verify the information and its source before publishing or broadcasting”.
Although saddled with the mandate of regulating the use of Information Technology (IT) in the country, the DG noted that in recent times, the responsibility has gone beyond establishing the DOs and DON’Ts due to the dynamic nature of technology which he said has further necessitated the need to up the ante in making journalists acclimatized with requisite skills and ‘technology know how’.
“We need to always reskill, update our knowledge and understand how the technology works in order to harness the potentials and use it for better things because technology can be used as either a tool or a weapon; so it is left for the user to decide what should drive the purpose…so everyone has a part to play in ensuring that unscrupulous elements don’t misuse the tech to mislead people”.
While describing journalism as the best medium to sensitize the public on what the Federal Government is doing towards achieving a digital Nigeria, Inuwa said the partnership would greatly be beneficial to both parties.
“As a government, we have an ambitious target of achieving ninety five per cent digital literacy by twenty thirty. It is not possible for us to train ninety five percent of the population on one on one basis, so we need to be innovative; We need to find a way of leveraging on organizations like yours to achieve that because if we can have people writing about digital literacy, the reach would be far more wider than what we can do as a government so that’s why we had already even started engaging your members in some states of the federation; training and letting them know they have a responsibility of helping the government in sanitizing the system so that we can address the challenge of fake news misinformation and disinformation”.
On the forthcoming National Executive Council/ Workshop on Digital Journalism organized by the Union, the NITDA Boss expressed interest in the planned programme and assured the body of the agency’s support.
He also encouraged the team to work out the modalities for the interventions/ trainings as requested in order for NITDA to know the number of members and make adequate provisions toward kick-starting the process.
Speaking earlier, the National President of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Chris Isiguzo while applauding NITDA for the different training sessions held for journalists in Jigawa, Kano, Gombe, Kebbi among other States he said the visit was to formally meet for the first time with the DG and also express the Union’s profound gratitude for the ongoing training packages so far and to seek for partnership at the national level.
“A journalist that is not exposed to constant training and retraining programmes is danger to the society and that’s why what you’re doing, we must applaud and we are also asking that we take it beyond and accommodate more of our people so that they will also benefit; that way, such issues about fake news which of course is about misinformation, disinformation and the rest of them would have been effectively tackled”.
Isiguzo also appealed for digital facilities to be provided for the Union’s National Secretariat and International Institute of Journalism in order to aid optimal operations.
“There’s a need that we get those facilities because most of our colleagues especially those operating online always come back because they don’t have offices and that’s why the umbrella body there is more like a shade and was provided to everybody that comes and when you have these people operate within one enclave control is easier. So we also want to demonstrate some level of control that’s why we are asking for your assistance with some of these facilities and I believe that it will go a long way in also helping the government and its message against fake news”.
The belief is that the partnership forged during the meeting will ultimately be a step closer towards making journalism practice in Nigeria more technologically driven and devoid of unprofessionalism while NITDA achieves some of its seven pillars in the Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP- 2021-2024) including Digital Literacy and Skills.
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