A university don, Dr. Isiaka Aliagan, has enjoined media owners and managers to convene a national summit to discuss the future of the media and work out a blueprint to salvage the industry.
Aliagan also encouraged government to include the media in its post-COVID-19 financial bailout as one of the segments of the economy already distressed. He noted that a healthier media industry can further help to entrench democracy and good governance.
Aliagan, who is the Head of Department, Mass Communication, Kwara State University (KWASU) stated this Wednesday, while delivering a lecture with the theme: Post COVID-19: Mitigating the Effects on Media Practitioners” at the Kwara NUJ Webinar 2020, jointly organised by the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Kwara state council and Goldrush Online Services.
The university don said the Newspaper Proprietors Association of Nigeria (NPAN), the Broadcasting Organisation of Nigeria (BoN) and professional unions need to re-strategise on the way out for the media and set up a lobby group to interface with government on how to help the media organisations.
“I am therefore using this medium to call on the government to approve financial bailout to the media, which had been canvassed by the NUJ in its letter to Mr. President on May 13, 2020 and the request for bailout made to the Minister of Information and Culture by the BoN, and to fully implement the recommendations of the Vision 2020 Committee on reinvigorating our media industry,” he said.
Aliagan stated that: “COVID-19 has not spared any aspect of human life, economically, politically and socially, but it has disrupted social and cultural interaction. And so, like every other businesses that has suffered from the lockdown occasioned by the spread of the pandemic, journalism business has taken a brutal bash, and the spiral effect may last beyond COVID-19 pandemic.
“In Nigeria, despite the donation of money running into billions of naira by individuals and organisations to government in the course of tackling the COVID-19 pandemic, and in spite of the fact that some arms of government claimed spending a fortune in social enlightenment on COVID-19 prevention in the media, many media houses defaulted in payment of salaries, cut salaries or asked staff to stay off work to avoid salary payment.
“In all of this, one of the critical sectors that will be and already is badly hit is the media which has suffered depletion in audience/readership and revenues as a result of the liberalisation of the information space resulting from the internet and new media technologies.
“Newspapers have had to embark on shedding of bloated workforce, shutting down of unproductive bureaus, and introduced several cost-cutting measures, including outsourcing of newspaper distribution, engaging freelance, instead of permanent staff, to survive, which are in line with measures taken in advanced media world,” he added.
While proffering solutions to the challenge of the pandemic of the media industry, Dr. Aliagan said: “There is a lot of catching up to do. In terms of adequate manpower, we are not yet there. Our training institutions must move from the analogue to the digital.”