A Thought On Proliferation Of Online Newspapers

Public vexation around the humongous rise of fake news believed to be occasioned by the proliferation of politically and regionally affiliated online newspapers in Nigeria’s cyberspace that becomes purveyors and peddlers of misinformation and disinformation, as well as the unprofessional and unethical practices of some newspapers, is one issue that shouldn’t be neglected and treated in thin air by the gatekeepers of the industry. 

The culprits are succeeding in achieving their fiasco end on the one hand, while the journalism industry is losing its priceless jewel of integrity and credible source of informing people what they ought to know without a second thought of consuming falsity. 

Owing to their intellectual wizardry right from time, the journalists were part of the respected set of individuals among equals but the emergence of citizen journalism and that of technology greeted an era of everyone-journalist that posed a significant threat to the profession. The fact that we don’t have citizen Lawyers, Engineers, Pilots, Medical Doctors, inter alia baffles a sane mind, and hard to believe a non-trainee of the discipline to be addressed as such in whatever respect although there existed some theories shielding in favour of the emergence of the citizen content creators but it failed to maintain the basic sanity and surface professional encroachment from the part of the perpetrators. 

In addition to the simplicity of its entry barriers that paved way for non-professionals to practice without prior intellectual training from Journalism and/or related discipline, the philosophy of attache by the proprietors to employ their kingpins from different disciplines is said to have been contributed to worsening the situation. 

Though there are some rare cases of different individuals in the industry that are doing well without prior knowledge in the discipline, it has been observed that their passion for the profession turned them in to be dedicated to learning the basic rudiments that will be guiding their intellectual rigor and sense of purposefulness to put their best in serving the public. 

The fact and basic truth remain that the Nigerian Broadcasting Commission (NBC), Nigerian Union of Journalists, Nigerian Press Council, Online Newspapers Proprietors of Nigeria, and all other relevant bodies must wake up from their long professional slumber and drop a call to this respect if their fondest wish is a national media space with specified and enforceable entry barriers coupled with a watch team that will ensure sanity and compliance to the Ilorin declaration of media ethics inter alia in the digital spaces. 

Musa, a Digital Media Strategist, wrote in from Kano