While assessing essays submitted for the recent 2nd Aisha Wakaso Award for Young Female Journalists in Niger State, six of the twelve entries were disqualified because they were found to be 100 percent written with Artificial Intelligence (AI).
The initiator of the award, Wakaso who is the Special Adviser, Print Media to the state governor at the presentation of awards to the winners lamented the over-reliance of youths on AI which reflected in the essays submitted.
“AI has come to make life easy but not to make you dumb. AI helps finetune what you have in you,” she stated explaining that her goal, which we applaud, is to groom young, courageous, and bold ladies to take up the baton of journalism.
There have been concerns about over-reliance on the use of AI for writing various reports which are supposed to be the brainchild of journalists and writers.
Some students are known to have used AI to generate answers for class assignments without many lecturers knowing.
We commend the Judges of the Award for being alert to spot the AI-written essays and disqualifying them.
It is unethical and deceptive to submit AI-written essays as original content for consideration for an award meant to reward outstanding female young journalists and any other competition.
Violation of copyrights and plagiarism are part of the code of ethics which every journalist, writer, or content creator should not indulge in.
According to the Code of Ethics for Nigerian journalists, a journalist should not copy, wholesale or in part, other people’s work without attribution and/or consent. Where a journalist reproduces a work, be it in print, broadcast, art work or design, proper acknowledgement should be accorded the author.
While AI tools can be used for researching topics and providing outlines for writing, using them to wholly write reports is not acceptable. Journalists should not become too lazy to write their copies and depend on AI to replace human input in writing.
Organisers of media awards should be vigilant to watch out for dishonest journalists whose entries are not original as they claim.
We congratulate the first prize winner, Salamatu Abdullahi Abubakar whose essay according to the judges stands out due to its comprehensive analysis, evidence-based approach, practical solutions, and engaging presentation.