- ...the average newspaper columnist in Nigeria seethes with bitterness; most anchor-men on radio and television are harsh and unsparing while leading discussions on government policies and actions; the on-line media, including champions of citizen journalism and bloggers are in a world without borders, lashing ferociously at what they consider bad governance in our land.
When a writer’s pen bleeds with bitterness in the press, it is caustic and when on air, a broadcaster or public affairs analyst is unsparing of public officials, his words and views are said to be toxic to the extent that they may even become hate speeches.
Unfortunately, such views whether from caustic pens or as toxic voices, they could also be laced with baseless rumors, deliberate distortions, weird exaggerations, unfounded allegations and half-truths with poor or without research which portray lack of diligence from the purveyors.
These are the realities of fake news and hate speeches that permeate media and public discourses today. This phenomenon is the bane of journalism and broadcasting in our land, pushed to the most dangerous limit by the borderless social media responsible for engineering wars and conflicts in many countries where bullet, blood and tears have replaced clean water, pure honey and satisfying or cooling milk; where children toys are now guns and grenades, where your next door neighbor is your potential murderer.
Indeed, the average newspaper columnist in Nigeria seethes with bitterness; most anchor-men on radio and television are harsh and unsparing while leading discussions on government policies and actions; the on-line media, including champions of citizen journalism and bloggers are in a world without borders, lashing ferociously at what they consider bad governance in our land.
So all who are concerned with the stability of our polity and the survival of the nation are pleading for the tempering of the caustic pens and sanitizing of the toxic voices who are setting public agenda in the mass and social media and shaping the opinion of the citizens on how the country should be run.
However, since the late 80s that efforts were initiated, albeit hypocritically, to build the truncated third republic, to the present that we are managing the fourth republic, actions and conducts of many political office holders, their utterances and machinations continued to fertilize the grounds for disturbing writings on paper and online; they continue nurture destabilizing or threatening discussions on air.
Therefore, it is a difficult task asking a writer confronted with the grim abuses by unpatriotic Nigerians in our polity not to see or hear the evil committed by these enemies of Nigeria. It is difficult to pretend that we are on the track to meeting and delivering on the UN development goals, whether the eight millenium ones (MDGs) targeted to be achieved by 2015 or the successor 17 SDGs being pursued. when some public officials are ripping off the nation as they take advantage of the privilege knowledge and information that they have about state policies to feather their own nests;
it is indeed difficult to assume that every stakeholder or key player in government is faithful to the implementation of the development agenda captured in so-called visions in the past and other reform initiatives when we see their compromises and indulgence in corrupt practices; to assume that corruption has been eliminated in our public life.
These are the pains of the caustic pen-wielders and the virulent critics on air. Otherwise, men and women with hollow moral fibers will continue to have excuse for smooth ride to power and wealth at the expense of the state and the citizenry.
The challenge of governance today requires that whistle –blowing becomes a strong pillar of deterring corruption in public life; it also demands fearless but dispassionate criticism of public policies as a tool of evaluating programme and projects cost and impacts; it necessitates robust and incisive discourses and analyses to assist government appreciate the concerns of all interest groups and stakeholders iin the polity ýn order to mainstream such views in delivering public service.
I believe we will soon have very good reasons to temper our caustic pens and toxic voices. Our columnists and anchormen are patriots whose tongues were broken in the past by leaders and public office holders who did not fulfil their electoral promises and constitutional mandates. Our critical columnists and audacious anchormen are straining to keep their voices of reason intact and heard clearly in the interest of the nation, to keep in touch so that the Fourth Republic will survive.
But as nation builders dreaming of Utopia, we have the honor and the onus to ensure that our concern for perfection does not result in chiselling away the entire wood while sculpting a fine artwork of Nigeria or behave like the insane mother throwing away the baby with the birth water after a laborious cleasing.
There must also be something good to tell about our nation, discoveries to be made, hope to be given; praises and adulation to be showered to give encouragement and motivation for good performance and credible public officials. It is therefore gratifying that we are subjecting our caustic pens and toxic voices to the test of honour by allowing for ombudsmen in our operations, rights of reply to the views we canvass and the news we carry, corrigendum on the errors we commit and clearly spelling out our professional code of practice so that the public too can hold us accountable in the performance of our duties.
Check out Daily Trust, The Punch and other newspapers who have openly declared their policies and ethics on advertorials and conduct of reporters on the field; check out our codes of reporting and the editorial guidelines of our various publications; check out the National Broadcasting Codes to which our radio and television stations subscribe and you will agree that we are not unaware of our tendencies or excesses and have therefore established in-built mechanisms for self-regulation to check ourselves and temper our toxic voices and caustic pens while mirroring the nation. After all, in our love for Nigeria which inspires such bitterness, we hate to see our pens bleed to death or our voices silenced at all.
So, the primary onus of ending fake news and hate speeches in any polity is Good Governance denoted with the following characteristics as outlined by the World Bank: participatory, consensus oriented, accountable, transparent, responsive, effective and efficient, equitable and inclusive and follows the rule of law.
These canons of Good Governance should be very discernible in the policies, programmes, agenda and initiatives of the new government led by President Bola Ahmed Ťinubu.