2019 elections: 14 February declared National Media Peace Day

AHEAD of the forthcoming general elections, Nigerian media practitioners have declared 14 February, 2019 as the National Media Peace Day.

The media practitioners from the print, broadcast, and the new media on Saturday in Abuja, made the declaration conscious of the need to engender violence-free elections.

National President of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Mr Chris Isiguzo, who read the declaration at the end of a two-day National Media Consultative meeting, directed all the 37 Chapters of the Union across the Federation to observe the day.

The meeting was put together by Search for Common Ground, an international non-governmental organization and supported by National Democratic Institute, United Kingdom Department for and International Development (ukaid), and United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

The declaration reads: “Nigerian media practitioners rose from a two-day meeting in Abuja on Saturday, February 9 and declared February 14 as the National Media Peace Day with the theme: ‘Nigeria Media Peace Day: Think Elections, Think Peace’.

“Practitioners from the print, broadcast, and the new media made the declaration conscious of the need to engender violence-free elections.

“The two-day meeting, organized under the auspices of an international non-governmental organization; Search for Common Ground, expressed apprehensions about the proliferation of small arms, thuggery, hate speech and fake news and called for caution on the part of the media and political actors.

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“The meeting also expressed apprehensions about the fate of persons with disabilities and other vulnerable groups taking part in the electioneering process and urged election management bodies to address the issue with the seriousness it deserves.

The Nigerian further enjoined all stakeholders in the electioneering process, political parties, politicians, the electorate, the judiciary and election management bodies to put Nigeria first in all their actions during the build-up to the 2019 general elections and beyond.

“It declared that the media is poised to disseminate news items, features, analyses, talk shows that would engender peace as a prerequisite to development,” it stated.

Senior Programme and Policy Analyst, Search for Common Ground, Bukola Ademola-Adelehin, said as part of efforts to ensure peaceful and violence-free elections in 2019, the organization decided to engage stakeholders at different levels including community, state, national and the media.

She noted that the Search for Common Ground was in states that have been declared as red alert states of possible violence- Adamawa, Borno, Plateau, and Benue state, adding that what the NGO came out with was a negative implication of rumour, hate speech, availability criminal armed groups, small arms among others.

He said the declaration of the February 14 as National Media Peace Day would help preach the message of peace further working with the media to dissuade people who have plot violence.