MEDIA managers have called on journalists across the country to turn their searchlights to the various activities happening at the local government councils with the aim of reporting them adequately.
Mr. Kehinde Bamigbetan, facilitator and consultant of Korki Associates made this call at a two-day training organised for journalists.
Held at Welcome Hotel, Ikeja, Lagos, participants drawn from different media houses in Lagos were trained on how to report events at the grassroots and also to key into the new social media.
With theme, Sharpening The Reporter’s Nose For News, the former chairman of Ejigbo local council disclosed that both the print and electronic media under report local government activities. He noted that grassroots activities only attract the media attention whenever there are emergencies.
He recalled that during the colonial and post-independent era, newspapers such as Iwe-Irohin, Daily Chronicles, The Nigerian Observer among others played vital roles in local government activities and governance.
He added that local governments in the past were very solid and effective because there were stable structures and institutions like traditional rulers, civil servants and colonial masters that checkmated and regulate their activities.
The training, which aimed at empowering journalists to enhance community reporting, embrace entrepreneurship, marketing and creating bankable businesses, was also to make enterprising journalists earn extra income, while still on their jobs.
Speaking on the training, Bamigbetan urged participants to use their phones and other gadgets to start a blog and to write on local government activities and businesses in the grassroots. He disclosed that services such as restaurants/catering, dry cleaning, hair dressing, shoemaking among others are thriving at the grassroots and should be reported.