A Republic led away from Democracy by its elite

A review of Watchdogs or captured media? A study of the role of the media in Nigeria’s emergent democracy, 1999-2016, ed. Ayo Olukotun (Lagos: Diamond Publications, 2018), + xxiv, 448 pp., ISBN: 978-978-964-740-8; prepared for the public presentation of the book at the AfeBabalola Hall, University of Lagos, Akoka, Lagos, on Tuesday, 22 May 2018.

This book has established for itself the status of a tour de force in the study of political communication in Nigeria’s Fourth Republic by being the first to pay serious and detailed attention to the ethical foundations of the Nigerian media landscape (focusing on newspapers, magazines, television, radio, and online news sites) in a troubled Republic that holds so much promise of development, peace and democracy but has so far delivered more of the opposite.

The purpose of this volume, along with the Big Puzzle that it seeks to unravel and the value it seeks to add to media practice and scholarship, is made clear in its opening pages where it is stated that  the book seeks to establish the degree to which the Nigerian media (specifically the print, electronic, and digital variants) in the Fourth Republic “had kept the traditions of a watchdog media alive or whether it had been captured by the political class through the familiar spoil-sharing arrangement, which characterizes much of Nigerian politics”.

I also agree with much of what celebrated Toyin Falola, author of the book’s Foreword, considers as the book’s contributions to media practice and theory while also offering comparative insights on its subject from Ghana, Kenya and South Africa. It has captured tensions in state-media relations, along with challenges on pathways to reform of relevant spaces and institutions while highlighting unfolding improvements and innovations in practice, process, platforms and technology.

The 13 substantive chapters address their topics in authoritative and detailed manners. not fully captured by the book’s title. For instance, Chapter One by the widely regarded Christian Ogbondah provides a detailed analysis of how state-media relations have provided constraints on media freedom in the specific terrains of constitutional and legal provisions and extra-legal actions, including financial constraints and other obstacles of unethical practices internal to media organizations. The chapter directly queries the extent to which Nigeria could be described as an emergent democracy as indicated in the book’s title.

Chapter Two, authored by Edaetan Ojo, offers the most authoritative account yet of the eventually successful 18-year struggle (1993-2011) for the enactment of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act. The struggle was spearheaded by key elements of civil society with Mr.Ojo’s Media Rights Agenda providing technical support for the struggle while it lasted. That it took another 12 years into the Fourth Republic after the end of military rule for the Act to be passed speaks volumes about the “democratic” credentials of the Republic’s post-military leaders.

Chapter Three by Lanre Idowu, who has literally invested his entire life monitoring media practice and encouraging best practices by the media in Nigeria through his Media Review and other platforms, is again most authoritative not only in its treatment of corruption in the media but also in indicating exceptions to the general rule. Between them, Ayo Olukotun’s Chapter 4 and Chapter 5 by Lai Oso and Tunde Akanni respectively address the changing economic, technological and ownership landscape of the media as well as the digital public sphere in a country that aspires to democracy. These issues are central to the determination of the nature of the public sphere in the contemporary world, and the two chapters masterfully interrogate them in the larger context of the mandate of the book.

Chapters Six and Seven address matters relating to the electronic media. In a chapter (Six) of impressive range and intensity, OluyinkaEsan addresses the place of television in what she appropriately describes as Nigeria’s democratic aspirations. On her own part, Funke-TreasureDurodola provides an incisive discussion of the talk radio’s potentials and achievements as a democratic tool for citizen engagement.

Specific attention is understandably paid to the role of the media in ethno-religious conflicts in two chapters (Chapters Eight and Nine). In Chapter Eight, Nathaniel Danjibo offers a perspective that scores the media above average but also notes constraints such as inadequate welfare for journalists, media ownership, ethno-cultural and religious biases, as well as inadequate investment in investigative journalism. In Chapter Nine, Ayo Olukotun and Margaret Ayo Jesuminure provide interesting data and note that while there is no evidence that the media directly incite violence, they do adopt positions once violence breaks out, engaging in what is called “enemy framing” of issues.

The next three chapters (10, 11 and 12) provide insights from the comparative experiences of African countries, namely, Kenya, Ghana, and South Africa.  The Kenyan case highlights government’s recourse to sophisticated, “silent” but effective process of emasculating the media in spite of the robustness of the constitutional, legal and institutional frames for media behaviour.

Writing on the Ghana experience of the media as watchdog, Kwame Karikari shows that the conditions for the media to exercise the level of independence and freedom required for them to perform that role exist in Ghana, but the media’s performance in this regard is adjudged by even industry stakeholders as falling far short of what is possible and necessary. Chapter 12 by Abiodun Salawu and Kayode Eesuola rounds off the book’s comparative section with a report on the media and elections in Nigeria and Ghana. The chapter ends on the note that, in regard of elections, the media in both countries “are indeed watchdogs, not captured”.

• Lagos to begin embedded power project in July 2018

The book’s concluding chapter offers a retrospective and prospective look on the fortunes of the Nigerian media in the Fourth Republic in terms of the original question that the book set out to answer: watchdog, or captured? Here, Ayo Olukotun, editor of the book, does an admirable job of putting together the matters arising from the various chapters to revisit the performance debate, an activity that appears to have led him away from the imagery suggested in the book’s title toward a more complex assessment.

Thus, in the face of compelling evidence from excellent studies of cases, issues and events, this important book concludes appropriately on a note that its core mandate to examine the extent to which the media have evinced the elements of either watchdog or that of capture has not been as unambiguous as originally conceptualized. It has shown that between watchdog and capture is a continuum rather than a disconnected choice of antonyms. This realization offers a more complex template for seeking appropriate recommendations for practice, policy, and scholarship that neither simplifies such enterprise nor seeks to apply solutions crafted from one experience indiscriminately to different contexts.

It could, for instance, be counterproductive to engage in the training of Nigerian journalists on the ethical foundations of the watchdog role of the media with toolkits developed from the United States experience. Even the Americans are still trying to grapple with the challenges of not only fashioning out appropriate ethical frames for their own media but also achieving broad consensus for such frames. For now, much of media mainstream in the United States reflects the view that the construction and pursuit of professional and ethical codes must be contextualized (see Ferre 2008: 164-166). A classic example of the latter was captured in a study of codes of ethics in 33 media organizations commissioned by the American Society of Newspaper Editors (Editors 2012) whose findings included many disparities among the media houses on the boundaries of the acceptable and the unacceptable on many matters.

All this, of course, is not to state that, in the realm of aspirations and ideals, ethical issues should not be stated in absolute terms. They should be. In the realm of practice, however, we have to continue to debate and valorize the boundaries of the possible and seek ways to approximate the ideal in all its positive prescriptions while finding ways to reduce the negative stumbling blocks on our path at various levels from individuals to corporate organisations to the national and international terrains.

For now, we are stuck with a “Republic” officially committed to democracy since its beginning almost two decades ago but all along literally led away from democracy by its political elite. I believe that Ayo Olukotun and his team have, with watchdogs or Captured Media?, ensured that soon, Nigerians will start talking again with renewed vigour on the complexities of the role of the media in the difficult terrain described above – and that would, indeed, be a good thing.

References

Editors (2012). “Special Issue: Code of ethics.” Journal of Mass Media Ethics 17, 2.

Ferre, A. (2008). “Commentary 2: Ethics should be measured in proper context.” Journal of Mass Media Ethics 23,2.

Adigun Agbaje is a Professor of Political Communication at the University of Ibadan, author of The Nigerian press, Hegemony, and the Social Construction of Legitimacy, 1960-1983 (1992), and corresponding editor for the journal, Media, Culture and Society(London).