…The NUJ has a point
The media in Benue State particularly the government owned outfits – the Ministry of Information, Radio Benue, The Voice Newspaper and Benue Television are not having it so nicely. The present state of their woes and neglect is killing them. The government established media organisations are drifting to near total collapse.
The outfits and their workers are in limbo with no hope of urgent resuscitation in sight. You can see the staffers with obvious frustration and pain of a people that can no longer fathom their right from left. They look like their problems and operate like herds with no shepherd, telling less of their acquired and accumulated professional experiences.
From the mother ministry of information to Radio Benue, from Benue Television to The Voice Newspaper, it is outcry upon agonies. Sordid inhabitable structures and deplorable environment, low morale of workers induced by neglect in forms of poor working conditions and renumeration, no training and retraining, lack of working tools and declined workforce, and the seeming go-slow of government on staff demands often conveyed by heads of the media organisations, etc, are hampering them.
The ministry of information has become a dumping ground when administrations makes government appointments. Political men and women of no professional media expertise are mostly deployed to the sector as commissioners. They come with zero knowledge of the sector, feeling frustrated with no or weak initiatives to foster the needed impact. They lament their postings all through and end up doing nothing tangible to positively transform the ministry with its departments and agencies. And they leave at the end of their tenure, redeployment or removal, without indelible footprints in achievement.
Information dissemination and media management is a professional conduct that should ordinarily not be manned by any dick and harry. It should be, exactly like the health ministry which is always headed by a medical professional. Round pegs must be put in round holes. This can up performance and enhance rapid sectoral growth.
But it seems governments and administrations always and deliberately look the other way. It appoints very strange persons as commissioners in charge of ministry of information.
In some states like Lagos, Rivers, Delta, Kano among several others, hardly a non-media professional is deployed to head the information ministry. Core journalists or professional media practitioners are consistently appointed information commissioners, including unit directors and, they normally strive to the desired change. They initiate and carryout reforms in the information MDAs more appropriately since they have the requisite knowledge of the system.
In Benue, an information commissioner who, is relatively appointed by some sort of inexplicable political connection, take to heels on simply hearing the name of radio, television or newspaper. They probably hear it for the first time or they come with the fear associated with media appearances. They appear unprepared with no what it takes to ginger the sector. They dabble and blabber, and wobble to the finish. And they work passively and inactively till their tenure elapse/ redeployed or sacked.
What is a primary school teacher, a chattered banker or mechanical engineer with no media training or practice doing as commissioner for information? Such appointee may perform, but not optimally as expected. Simply, the ministry of information needs a journalist or core media professional with a touch of political dexterity to man it, period!
Remembering some decades ago, the ministry of information once had some good performers. For example, it had the likes of Prof. Terhemba Shija and Dr. Cletus Akwaya, very thorough bred media experts who held sway at varied times as commissioners. Somehow recently, Dr. Ngunan Beeka Addingi, a media professional did it too.
During Shija, Akwaya and Addingi’s era, the system was noticeably swift and sharp. The staff were put on toes. The language and operation was simply information. Workforce was boosted where there was obvious decline. Radio Benue and The Voice Newspaper, as well as Benue Television had their time and best. Truth is, the ministry of information need professionals to always man it, not market men and women.
Peeved by a glaring deplorability in the ministry of information and government owned media organisations, the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) Benue State Council, chaired by Comrade Bemdoo Ugber, recently convened an emergency statewide Congress to discuss the poor state of the sector.
It was a gathering of cream-de-la-cream of practicing journalists in the state, past and present. The union members were visibly infuriated. They said it is no longer time to play to gallery but call a spade by its name. They were harsh and ruthless. They queried and angered with neglect of government media outfits and the poor condition of their workers.
This is the first time the Benue journalists would sound stern. Their tone and pen to paper lines were factual, fearless and straightforward. They were damned that “asoo ga i sawa”…let the worse happen.
They came hard on the administration of Governor Hyacinth Iormem Alia. But Rev. Fr. Alia is a good friend of the media who had done to them, by cordial relationship, what previous administrations never did. But the journalists were not this time interested in freebies and perks, they were calling for total overhaul of the information ministry and its MDAs for overall interest of all its members.
At the end of the crucial Congress, a strongly worded communique was issued. It was vehement and straight to the point – restructure Radio Benue, The Voice Newspaper and Benue Television.
The communique read: “Congress decried the deplorable condition of state-owned media outfits, including Radio Benue, The Voice Newspaper, and Benue Television. It urged the government to take urgent and decisive steps to renovate, reposition, and restructure these establishments to meet modern professional standards.
”Congress expressed concern over delay in the implementation of weigh-in allowance for some staff of media organizations, the non-issuance of Personal Subhead Numbers (PSN) to staff of The Voice Newspaper, and the shortfall in the implementation of the minimum wage for workers in some media organizations. It mandated the State Working Committee (SWC) of the NUJ to work collaboratively with their RATTAWU counterparts to interface with the Head of Service with a view to ensuring the prompt implementation of the weigh-in allowance and the resolution of other outstanding issues affecting media workers in the state,” it stated.
Be that as it may, let it be said that there is more to restructuring government owned media organisations than what the NUJ is clamoring. The political will of government to listen to pressing demands and respond appropriately is key.
Trained Journalists do not bribe government officials, neither sleep at their gates to beg. They set agenda and hold the government to account. And here too, the Benue NUJ has set an agenda, and has voiced grievances. Remaining for government to be responsive and comply.
What the NUJ demanded at that crucial Congress, if finally implemented by Governor Hyacinth Alia, his administration will be achieving a milestone in the information sector.
One critical point very hopeful is that, the Governor Alia as we are seeing to govern should forget the messenger (NUJ) and adopt the message, act swiftly and turn things around at the ministry of information, to write his name in gold. It will be a major achievement of his administration, like he is doing in roads construction and industrialization.
Let Governor Alia not forget, and take that resounding step in the ministry of information, like he has done to other sectors.
What remains a plea is for the governor’s media handlers to shove wranglings and facilitate a positive outcome and not misinterpret the NUJ demands.
Any which way, what will be shall be but there would definitely be a reflection someday, where it will show if there was a restructuring of government owned media outfits or not.
Ayado, a Veteran Journalist and Policy Communications Expert writes from Makurdi, Benue State
