PROFESSIONALISM AND THE REPORTING OF DIVERSITYAND CONFLICT ISSUES IN THE NIGERIAN MEDIA

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the coverage of diversity and issues of conflict in the Nigerian media. It discusses the nature of diversity in a plural and multicultural setting and argues that quite often it is the politicization or poor handling of issues of diversity that lead to violent outbreak of conflicts in the country. A number of factors and agents are usually associated with frequent outbreak of conflicts, principal among which are the country’s media. The media have been variously blamed for their role in the exacerbation of different conflicts in complex and heterogeneous Nigeria. Some of these accusations against the media could be associated to the weak observance and, in some cases, total disregard for the journalistic professional code of ethics. The deficit in abiding by the professional code of ethics in covering diversity and conflict issues have created the erroneous impression that the Nigerian media are more interested in emphasizing the existing ethnic, religious and other forms of differences than the common issues that strengthen the unity of the country. The paper concludes by recommending the strategies for improving the coverage and the reporting of diversity and issue of conflict in the media in a society like that of multicultural Nigeria.

INTRODUCTION

In the last few years, Nigeria has experienced an alarming rise in the manifestation of violent conflicts. These include ethnic, religious, political and other types of conflicts that have led to massive loss of lives, destructions and heightening of suspicion and hatred among the citizens. Indeed, the intensification of such conflicts in one the states of the Federation specifically Plateau State earned it the imposition of an emergency rule with the suspension of the democratic structure in the state in 2004.

Questions are being asked on the reasons for the upsurge in violent conflicts in the land in recent years. Why do people of different ethnic backgrounds kill each other? Why do adherents of different religions feel threatened by each other? Why do supporters of different political parties take up arms against each other? Why do farmers fight pastoralists? Why are our governments and institutions failing to monitor and contain these conflicts? Whom do we blame? Could it be specific individuals or institutions? Or, do we blame our mechanisms of social interactions? The answers may not be provided here. Let us simply reflect on some of these issues from the perspective of a mass communication student.

Reading through the literature on diversity and conflict in Nigeria, there seems to exist an agreement that the politicization and poor mediation of diversity and conflict issues in a pluralistic Nigeria have been partly accountable for the negative turn of events (Lyman, 1988; Egwu, 2001; Albert, 2002 and Pate 2002). Arguably, one institution that has received occasional knocks for its management of diversity and conflict issues is the media for “its role in the exacerbation” of ethnic and religious violence in the country (Egwu, 2001). Of course, this is debatable. However, the probable reason for the existence of such a perception may be related to some observed professional deficiencies in the handling of diversity and conflict issues by the mass media in a complex, diverse and heterogeneous society like Nigeria.

Thus, our objective in this paper is to examine the application or misapplication of professional ethics in the coverage of diversity and conflict issues in Nigeria. We shall also suggest strategies that are likely to enhance the application of professional ethics in media reporting of diversity and conflict matters.

DIVERSITY AND CONFLICT

Diversity is a fact of life. Without it life would be boring, flat and hardly interesting. By simple understanding, diversity is heterogeneity, differences or dissimilarity in several respects. In the words of Albert (2002), diversity “connotes heterogeneity or dissimilarity on the grounds of sex, cultural practice, ethnic origin, religious affiliation, ideological stance, political leaning, level of social development, place of habitation and so on.” Diversity connotes multiculturalism, pluralism and variety. For example, Nigeria is appropriately described as a diverse country comprising of over four hundred ethnic groups, more than 140 million people, pursuing different engagements, speaking different languages, adhering to different religious leanings and different political orientations, and so on. Of course, it would be unrealistic for any one to expect that all of us would think and behave in the same manner. Or, to assume that because we are all Nigerians, the various cultural groups and religions can fuse into one group for all our problems to “die away”. No wonder, therefore that the issue of diversity has remained very important in several countries like the United States and Nigeria (Duncan, 2002). This importance possibly is borne out of the realization that in a mix where “diverse people” meet, most especially as a result of social and geographical contacts, a culture shock is produced (Furnham and Bochner, 1986). Thus, the politicization or poor mediation of diversity could produce shocks that can explode into social conflict with devastating consequences.

Conflict basically involves disagreement, clash, collision or a struggle or contest between two or more parties. There are many technical definitions of the term depending on the understanding of the person making it. For instance, Hocker and Wilmot (2002) consider conflict as “an expressed struggle between two or more interdependent parties who perceive scarce resources, incompatible goals and interference.” Another definition from Laue (2002) describe conflict as “an escalated competition at any system level between groups whose aim is to gain advantage in the area of power, resources, interest, and needs and at least one of the groups believes that this dimension of the relationship is mutually incompatible”.

We find the next definition from Lund (1997) quite relevant to our discourse in this context. To him, conflict occurs “when two or more parties perceive that their interest are incompatible, express hostile attitudes or pursue their interest through actions that damage the other parties. These parties’ may be individuals, small or large groups, and countries”. Stated differently, there is a relationship between an individual’s perception of reality and his or her understanding of a conflict situation. Interestingly, too, individuals perceive and interpret events differently due to the difference in our socialization patterns, life experiences and personal philosophies, among others. So, our actions could be linked to our perceptions. Perceptions, according to Weeks (1992):

…are the lenses through which we see ourselves, others, our relationship, and the situations we encounter. As such, perceptions wield an enormous influence over our behaviour. If we perceive something to be a certain way, even if we are incorrect, in our minds, it is that way, and we often base our behaviour on that perception. Perception greatly influences the way people and societies mould their attitudes and much of their behaviour, and therefore play a major role in the cause of conflict and in the way we deal with it.

The validity of Week’s (1992) assertion could be seen in how individuals interpret various conflicts in the country. The examples are numerous. Remember the Kaduna, Plateau and Numan inter-religious/ethnic conflict, the Lagos inter-tribal conflict, the Tiv-Jukun fights, the Tafawa Balewa crises, the Niger-Delta uprising, the Maiduguri Labour demonstrations, the Ife-Modakeke conflicts, the Yungur/Fulani fights, the numerous communal land disputes, various religious uprisings, chieftaincy tussles and many more. The consequences of these conflicts on the country are indeed enormous. These included deaths, destructions, displacements, mistrust, hatred, suspicions and tense relationship between individuals, groups and communities with enormous stress on continuous peaceful coexistence in the country.

Today, there are visible signs of the failure of existing state and civil society institutions to be able to keep up with mounting social stress and pressures in the country. Consequently, diversity and conflict issues are inappropriately, in some cases, mischievously handled and poorly managed with the media acting, even if unwillingly, as the mediating agents.

PROFESSIONALISM IN THE MEDIA

There is an on-going debate on the status of journalism as a profession. Scholars are variously divided on the issue. While some argue that like medicine, law and teaching, journalism can also be regarded as a profession; many others would prefer to classify it as a craft (Head, 1963; Golding, 1977; Osiel, 1986; Ibelema, 1993; McQuail, 2000; and Woo, 2003).

Like most social science concepts, professionalism has been variously defined. One of the proponents of professionalism described a profession as full time occupation, which assumes a centrality in the life of the professional, often abolishing boundaries between work and leisure. He said that professionals come to derive satisfaction from the work itself, not simply from the conditions of work or the rewards it offers (Moore, 1972). According to Nwosu (1987), professionalism is “a set of principles, ideas, attitudes and activities that characterize and guide the behaviours of members of any occupational group anxious to gain and maintain both in-group and out-group acceptance of its professional standing”.

Explaining further, Nwosu argued that professionalism entails high education, specialized training, and self-organisation into an association of practitioners. Other elements include occupational commitment, professional ideology and code of conduct. A further excursion into the literature would reveal that certain criteria have been identified as necessary in a profession. These include the systematic acquisition of specialized skills based on theoretically grounded knowledge, exclusive right to exercise those skills, a public service (as opposed to commercial interest) orientation, a high level of related ethical standards, and autonomy in setting those standards and regulating practice (Ibelema, 1993); McQuail, 2000)

Looking at the above criteria, one wonders if journalism can rightly and automatically qualify as a profession. However, we can safely argue that journalism exhibits some of the attributes associated with professionalisation. For example, we could find in journalism the existence of a code of ethics, desire for autonomy, independence, high level of education among practitioners, and very importantly, public service. Though the aspect of public service is often disregarded, Journalists, however consider it important to the extent of regarding themselves as the Fourth Estate, “independent of public or private power centres. Their mission was disclosure; their canon, objectivity; their discipline, reification; their credo, the people’s right to know” (Woo, 2003).

Our position is that no matter what one feels about the professional status of journalism, let it be appreciated that “the purpose of journalism is more than reporting and writing of stories… skills and competence are essential. Its purpose has to do with something more fundamental…serving the public trust… providing the news and information that free people need to make political, economic, social, and personal decisions” (Woo, 2003). The point, however, is that one should be able to understand the contextual or operational environment in which the journalist practices. For example, comparative studies have found out that news media in developing countries enjoy much less autonomy, suffer from shallow reporting, and are more likely to breach standards of neutrality and objectivity, accuracy and facticity, and ethics than in developed countries (Ekwelie, 1986; Rugh, 1987; Boafo, 1992; Sen,. 2004).

REPORTING CONFLICT IN THE MEDIA

Conflict is naturally attractive and a source of news for the media. Indeed, it is seen as “the bread and butter” of journalism (Owens-Ibie, 2002). Conflict sells. Thus, with the drive for profit by the private media and the commercialization policy in government owned outfits, our media organizations “find ready raw material” in conflict. As reported by Owens-Ibie (2002), the media in homogeneous societies tend to air conflict less than those in pluralistic societies like Nigeria. He argued that conflict coverage reflects the socio-cultural and other diversities in the country.

Expectedly, people turn to the media for relevant information during conflict or crisis periods. Studies have shown that the media have remained the most credible source of news and information to most people. As argued by Musa (2003), the importance of the media goes beyond just providing information per se. For most of the times we also use such information to form opinion on very serious issues in material life. Earlier studies have long established a relationship between issues considered important and issues that the public also consider important. Even though they do not tell us what to think, the media are found to direct our minds on what to think about. A number of attempts have been made to analyse the pattern of media coverage of diversity and conflict issues in the country. From the various studies, one can easily summarise the common professional errors that are often found in the media (Akinfeleye, 2003; Albert, 2002; Yusuf, 2002; Pate, 2002; Ojo, 2000).

PROBLEMS

A number of problems have been identified in the nature and pattern of covering diversity and conflict issues in the Nigeria media. These include:

1. Promoting, by selective reporting, prejudicial stereotypes about groups and individuals.

2. Reporting inter-group conflicts out of their fundamental sociological, economical, political and other contexts. In many cases, media persons merely respond to statements of politicians, ethnic champions, religious zealots and other interested party rather than initiate their own independent inquiries about specific social conflict.

3. Making generalized statements not supported by concrete facts and figures.

4. Attribute statements by individuals to collectives.

5. Publishing of rumours as facts.

6. Publishing unfair and discriminating adverts.

7. Use of inflammatory language in news reporting.

8. The problem of editors allowing the letters column and opinion pages to be used to make inflammatory statements against some people or groups.

9. The use of inflammatory, misleading and sensational headlines to attract sales.

10. Demonisation of certain ethnic, religious or political groups in an already divided and tensed society.

11. The use of cartoons to malign a community, group or individual.

12. Use of unrepresentative pictures

13. Un-objective and clearly biased reporting against some groups, individuals or communities.

14. Inappropriate usage of language in reporting conflict stories.

15. Total blackout on some groups, individuals or community

16. Expression of ill-informed opinions by columnists, writers, etc. on issues that affect certain groups of people in the country.

17. Shallow and episodic coverage.

CONSEQUENCES

The failure of many Journalists to abide by the professional code of ethics which emphasizes objectivity, balance, fairness, thoroughness, honesty and relevance have led to the perception that many of our media organs through their coverage of conflict and diversity “often de-emphasize how to make a contribution towards a culture of peace, and build policies and leadership ethos that could support sustainable peace making. Instead, the Nigerian press raises more issues about our differences as ethnic and religious groups than our similarities” (Albert, 2002).

Perhaps, the above problems may not all be deliberate, but a manifestation of mental laziness, professional incompetence, poor research and analytical skills, and very disturbingly, arrogance found among some media personnel. For example, it is not uncommon to read, watch, or listen to poorly researched, ignorantly written and inappropriately delivered pieces that embarrassingly portray poverty of ideas on the ethnography, history, sociology and other attributes of the various peoples in this country. Journalists who produce such materials end up confusing, antagonizing and dividing farther the people instead of educating and uniting them. In the words of Dahlgren (1992), “Journalists must become sensitive to, and acknowledge such aspect as the multiple subjectivities of every life…”

We also disagree with the common notion especially among government officials, that suppressing information during tense moments is desirable or necessary. This may be dangerous and counter productive; because to pretend that the conflict did not happen will create room for circulation of vicious rumours and dependence on non-credible alternative sources of information. Instead, it could be reported accurately without using inflammatory language. As noted by Sankore, (2001), “Nothing has a greater capacity to undermine the moral and ethical credibility of a writer or the media than evidence of distorted reporting of factual events. In Journalism what is omitted is sometimes of greater value than what is reported”.

However, if we examine the challenges of the Nigerian Journalists, we can understand that many of them work to beat very strict deadlines. They are handicapped by weak resource base, poor infrastructural facilities, absence of some basic working tools and inadequate security cover, among others. Consequently, they are forced to depend on unreliable or incomplete sources of information without conducting proper, deeper, and contextually relevant journalistic investigations. In fact, there were extreme situations when some journalist lost their lives covering conflicts in the country (Ojo, 2000).

Similarly, some of the Journalists, even where they appear competent are often subdued by the attitudes and policies of their individual media houses to the detriment of their professional honour. Thus, it is important to also address media owners for their understanding in this issue.

Closely linked to the above is the survival instinct pervading most media organizations. In their desire to sell copies and attract viewers and listeners, they trample upon all journalistic ethics through “colourful, unique and unexpected” stories, which may have negative consequences on the society.

It is also common knowledge that several media houses that appear national in their publications and broadcasting are anything but national in their employment policies. Take a general look at the by-lines in many newspapers and magazines, and convince yourself on the diversity that exists in the individual newsrooms.

UPHOLDING PROFESSIONALISM IN THE REPORTING OF DIVERSITY AND CONFLICT ISSUES

For the media to be eminently respected and trusted, its personnel must demonstrate professional competence in dealing with issues of diversity and conflict. Of course, the starting point is for the media environment to be diverse by reflecting in their structure and content the various social, economic and cultural realities of the society in which they operate, in a more or less proportional way. For instance, a diverse newsroom would be expected to reflect staff and content diversity to reflect its area of coverage.

Secondly, it is important to note that there is a growing interest in what is referred to as “peace journalism”. Scholars like Galtung (1998), Albert (2000), MacDonald (2002) and Akinfeleye (2003) advocate for peace journalism by insisting that diversity and conflict issue should be professionally reported with peace building objectives being the guiding principle. Major requirement of peace journalism include “balance news coverage, positive education of people about what is going on in a divided society, controlling dangerous rumours and providing a trusted source of information for all parties in a conflict”. In the words of Albert (2002), peace journalism is:

…a “journalism of attachment” to all actual and potential victims. It stands for the truth as opposed to incitements, lies and propaganda that often dominate war journalism. The peace journalist thus has eyes for the essential; the devotion both to fact and hope… it takes right training, determination, environment and exposure…

THE WAY FORWARD

To be able to rectify some of the observed problems and ensure professional handling of diversity and conflict issues in the Nigerian media, we wish to suggest the following options:

1. Institute the teaching of diversity and conflict reporting in the curricula of Journalism and Mass Communication training Departments all over the country to adequately prepare up-coming journalists on their professional roles as peace journalists in multicultural settings.

2. Provide continuous retraining programmes to practicing journalists through refresher workshops and conferences on handling diversity issues in the media.

3. Train journalists to monitor early warning signs of conflict in specific areas for them to be able to draw the attention of the government and the general public.

4. Encourage media houses that claim national outlook to diversify their individual newsrooms by employing personnel from all sections of the country. For example, media outfits in the southern part of the country should deliberately consider recruiting news personnel from the northern part of the country and vice versa.

5. Improve the remunerations and working conditions of the journalists to discourage many of them from dangerous sensationalism which occasionally lead to needless conflict situations.

6. Help through different strategies to make the Nigerian journalist more responsive to the reporting of diversity and conflict issues through some of the following steps suggested by Botes, (1998):

i) Facilitating healthy communication between diverse groups and conflict parties;

ii) Educating members of the public about diversity and conflict issues;

iii) Building trust between groups and not further widening the existing gaps between them;

iv) Counteracting misperceptions;

v) Helping to constructively analyze issues in diversity and conflict;

vi) Identify the interest underlying certain conflict issues in the society;

vii) Providing an emotional outlet in terms of allowing groups to constructively express their grievances in a non combative manner;

viii) Encouraging a balance of power;

ix) Framing and defining conflicts;

x) Promoting face saving consensus building most especially during a negotiation process;

xi) Solution building.

CONCLUSION

A critical examination of the contents of our media as they relate to diversity and conflict issues would reveal a disturbing neglect of many of the professional attributes of journalism, i.e. public service orientation, observance of strict ethical standards and the regulation of those standards, among others. In other words, there is a lot of quackery in the practice of journalism in the country. And this calls for a re-orientation among our journalists in their approach to diversity issues, and the increased vigilance of the public in scrutinizing what the media do. As observed elsewhere, “while the news media need close examination and warrant the same type of scrutiny and analysis they impose on other institutions, there is not strong tradition of media criticism in this country. Nor are the news media themselves properly self critical” (Kerr, 1992). Therefore, it is a challenge for all the stakeholders, to insist on the observance of professionalism, in the conduct and performance of our journalists and media organizations. It is a realizable proposition as well as desirable prescription for the continued survival of diverse Nigeria.

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