Dr. Kwaghkondo Agber is a senior lecturer at the Department of Theatre Arts, University of Abuja. In this interview with AWAAL GATA, Agber, who has two PhDs – in Mass Communications and History – while x-raying the Nigerian media, says the interference of the government stops it from discharging its constitutional responsibilities. He also advises the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) to be more orderly in its dealings
What is your overview of the Nigerian media?
The Nigerian media has come a long way. If you take a look at it, you will see that there have been so many challenges. The challenge of reporting colonialism, anti-colonialism, and after independence, having to change over from attacking an enemy – the colonial government –, how do we now adjust to a government that is ours; and in any case, most of those who owned the country’s media outlets were mostly politicians. Azikiwe had The Pilot; Awolowo had The Tribune and so on. So, there was that crisis of adjustment, but they performed credibly well. Over the years there have been a lot of challenges, especially during military regimes. In those regimes, there were legal obstacles that were put in place to gag the press. There was Decree Four, and so on; nevertheless, I would say they have been doing very well. The problem has always been during democracies; media supposed to be free during democracies. If you look at the Constitution, especially the 1979 and 1989 Constitution, you will find that there is a provision – it does not specifically talk about press freedom, but the obligations of the press and the responsibility of the press to act as a watchdog. But must often, must governments in Nigeria don’t allow the press to discharge those responsibilities that they constitutionally have.
How does this hamper development?
It hampers development a lot, because practitioners are not as free as they should be. For example, look at the Freedom of Information Bill; ordinarily, the Bill talks about when you can apply for information, if you are not going to be given, the reason for that must be provided, but that does not happen. You apply and at times no response, because the government that passes and signs it does not think it is obligated under that law. I don’t think there is any ministry that responds the way it should.
How should this problem be solved?
It could be solved when Nigerians challenge the impunity in the court. When two, three, four instances they find that they cannot get away with it, they will learn their lessons and act upon that. The problem with Nigeria is that people are always afraid to challenge those in authority. As long as we don’t challenge some of these impunity, they will continue.
Some people believe the Nigerian media is elitist; do you agree?
Let us categorize the media into several arms. We have radio, television, newspaper, internet, and so on. The press by its nature is elitist. And when I talk of press, I am talking of print. Print is elitist because you have to be educated to be able to read newspapers. You have to be educated to read magazines. So they are not meant for everybody, even if you publish in pidgin; it is not everybody who speaks pidgin that can read it. You must have gone to school, and once you do that, you are no longer a common villager who cannot read and write. If you take television, there is nowhere in the world where television freely distributed; you need to buy it and all that. To even watch some channels, you have to subscribe. Now it is a different ballgame when you come to the radio; radio sets are becoming cheaper, and they have permeated all facets of the society. In Nigeria, it is very rare to find a community without a set. The average Fulani pastoralist has a set. You would not know that they are more enlightened than some people in the towns. There are BBC Hausa programmes, VOA Hausa, Radio France International Hausa, and recently I stumbled upon Radio China Hausa, because they know that there is a clientele there willing to listen. So if you look at that categorization you can say that some media are elitist and some are not, so I don’t think I agree totally. Attempts have been made in some countries to establish community media; Community Radio, Community Television and so on, but then who controls it? It still doesn’t put television sets in the houses of the owners. Actually, the community might own it, but that does not give an average community member the money to buy an average newspaper. In Nigeria, an average newspaper sells for N150. To an average man, N150 is a lot of money considering the statistics that most Nigerians don’t afford $1 per day.
Why is University of Abuja not offering Mass Communication at undergraduate level?
It is my responsibility to start it; I don’t want to start a theoretical programme. Mass Communication is not theoretical, it is practical. For you to do it well there must be a studio for radio and television.
But must universities don’t have studios and they still offer it…
That is what I don’t want to do; if I do that, when students graduate what do they graduate with? I don’t want my students to be half-baked journalists after graduation. So when the university is ready to provide the facilities, we will start the programme. The Senate has approved for us to start, but for the facilities, we will not start yet.
Right now, there is a proliferation of half-baked journalists in the country; how should the situation be arrested?
If you look at the Nigerian Press Council (NPC) decree, it is the responsibility of the Council to accredit schools of Journalism and Mass Communication, the same way like Council for Legal Education accredits Law Schools and the Medical and Dental Council accredits medical schools, among others. So, when JAMB does its duties, you lay standards for any school of Mass Communication, Journalism, Media Arts and so on. The Council should say that for a school to start the courses, certain minimum standards must be met. That is the only way that some of the problems we are having can be checked. If you go to some federal and state universities, you cannot justify a student reading Mass Communication, because the studios are not there. So what are you training the students for? Undergraduate courses are not theoretical, everybody ought to know that. A student should come out being able to write news and produce news, but without a studio how can the students practice? I have had an opportunity to interview prospective journalists for print and television media; the general performance was ridiculous. You ask a graduate to lay an outline for a news stories, and he doesn’t even know what you are talking about. He doesn’t know that news has components. Must students come here for Masters and when I am teaching them a course called News Writing and Production, must often I do go back to start from the basics as if they are undergraduates. So, the NPC, which is facing a lot of problem itself, should be empowered to do that, because that law takes the responsibility away from the NUJ and puts it squarely on the shoulders of the Press Council.
It is now widely believed that the internet is wresting the powers of the mass media; do you agree?
That is what many people are saying, but don’t forget that the internet has been in the Europe and American since 1980s and it has not been able to completely wrest the powers of the print media. You know, every new medium challenges the existing one. It used to be cinema but when the radio came, everybody switched to the radio. However, after some time, people went back to the cinema. In advance countries, cinema is a culture, and some films generate billions. California, which is in the United States, generates about 70% of its revenue from the cinema industry. California is the film capital of the world. When television came, everybody also drifted but it has not taken the shine off cinema and radio and it has not done anything against newspapers. Yes, some people would drift and not come back, just like what is happening with the internet now. I teach Media Arts and I don’t like reading on-line; I prefer a hard-copy because it is easier to navigate. For you to navigate easily, you need a very fast internet network which is not available in most developing countries. In Nigeria you cannot even listen to a radio station online, similarly, for a web page to open it take a very long time; so in Nigeria, newspaper is the easiest medium. In Europe and America, some are now streaming their contents on-line, but it still has not killed the print and I don’t see that happening.
Are you okay with the contents of Nigerian newspapers?
If you take the gamut, you find a lot of things lacking. Many Nigerian newspapers don’t have strong sub-desk editors. If I check a newspaper and see that stories are poorly written and the editing is very bad; I feel that something is wrong. By the time somebody reaches the position of an editor, it means that he had paid his dues; he should be able to edit and put together a good team at the sub-desk. But that is not what you find in Nigerian newspapers. For example, take a look a typical Nigerian columnist; alright, the views are his but you take a time and read it you wouldn’t find a cardinal for what he is trying to say. There must be a direction to a contribution. I don’t mind the perspective from which you come, but let me at least understand you. There are some people you read and wonder where they are coming from; the English is poor, and so many other things. I can’t just read a columnist who is not communicative. But my worry is even in news stories. News stories are the hallmark of journalism. Taking a look at some international newspapers, you will see high quality of everything – objectivity, creativity, impartiality and other obligations of the press – but here, you would not find them.
How should these problems be solved?
The NUJ should organize its house. It should put its house in order. Incidentally, I once worked in the same complex with the Union, and I saw how unorganized it was and I very much know that it is still is. In Britain, we were students’ members of the journalism union there, and we saw how they worked in the organization. In the union, if you don’t register, you have no business setting step into anything journalism. Take a look at NUJ’s registration exercise; you will see that many journalists are not registered. If the NUJ is properly organized, then, it can enforce
