By Rhoda Olorunfemi
Executive Director of Media Career Development Network, Mr Lekan Otufodunrin has urged journalists and media houses to adequately prepare to cover the upcoming election
He made the call at training on election coverage for the staff of The Nation Newspaper held last Thursday, January 31, 2019.
He noted that maintaining trust, proper planning, getting facts and figures accurately are key issues in ensuring good reports.
According to him, more than ever before, the reading public is more knowledgeable and cannot be taken for granted through casual coverage.
He said the audience are now well-informed, and everybody is looking for real facts and figures of the stories during the election period. Journalists on every beat should put in their best to challenge promises by politicians on how they plan to execute programmes.”
Otufodunrin who was former Online Editor of The Nation also spoke on the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act, 2011, which he said Journalists should use to get information concerning how public funds is spent.
The new Online Editor Mr. Sunday Oguntola, while addressing participants implored staff to always visit the website and social media portals of the company and share links to stories on their handles.
Specifically he admonish the journalists to do the following to enhance their coverage:
- Be guided by the laws of the land. Electoral and media laws
- Recon with ethics and codes
- Democratic accountability
- Ascertaining the truth
- Be careful of hate speech
- Be conflict-sensitive
- What to do in a violent and hostile environment
- Taking safety seriously
- Reporting minorities: women, youths, new parties, new aspirants
- Ask tough questions to get answers people will want to read
- Be analytical in your reporting
- Need for more informed analysis
- Have peoples voices in reports and analysis
- Fact-check claims
- Infographics, Data, Facts
- Leave your biases out of reporting, the readers can always know when we do
- News is no longer enough. People want to know why and implications
