By Abiola Ayakunbi
Events of the past few days in the media industry have not been palatable. Many employees have been sent on an indefinite leave without pay. And that was after they were paid certain percentages of their salaries for about two months. Those that are still on the pay roll have their salaries reduced by certain percentages ranging from 15 to 50%. Specifically, The Nation, The Punch and Nigerian Tribune had reviewed the employments of some of their employees. It is their rights to do so. There is a possibility that other media houses will likely follow suit in the coming days because follow-follow approach reigns supreme in the industry
nduka obaigbena, president of Newspapers propritors association, NPAN.
The most unfortunate of this development is that print media, electronic media and many online publications did not give adequate media coverage to the sad development. Few people used their social media accounts and passed the information on the layoff, sack, etc without giving details. This gave room for speculations, a particular newspaper among the three mentioned above was alleged to have sacked over 100 staff.
Few weeks ago, front pages of newspapers were all about the purported layoff in Access Bank. Media stayed on this news item and the Central Bank of Nigeria had to issue a statement that the concerned Bank should halt the process. Although, there is a possibility that the Bank may device other means of easing out the staff.
The media celebrated the sack of employees in the companies which Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and Chief Olusegun Obasanjo have interests on their cover pages. Unfortunately, media houses are less rigorous when it comes to the problem affecting the industry.
The media is a public institution and must be seen displaying so. It has practically remained difficult to hold those at the helms of affairs accountable. The primary objective of every organization worldwide is to make profit and ultimately add value to the society. Media organizations in Nigeria are no exemptions. They are set up nationwide to inform, educate and entertain the reading publics through the publication of quality and enriching news content.
The latest development is as a result of the ongoing COVID-19. However, this was aggravated by the many years of mismanagement on the part of some media managers. The present problem is that, the cash flow is very low. When this happens, the first thing to do is to examine the product (newspaper) that is being offered to the reading market. It has to be established whether it meets the expectations of the readers or not. Are there still readers of hard copies and where are they located? Many questions!! This can only be achieved through a thorough marketing research. Regrettably, many newspaper houses in Nigeria do not like to commission any research about their contents, quality and marketing operations, rather, they delve on intuitions. It is vital at the outset, to be very clear what information is needed and for what purpose. Once the newspaper is right, readers will buy it and the reach in terms of circulation will command the much needed advertising revenue.
It is a well known fact that newspapers at one time or the other may experience declining or faltering demand. This is a state in which demand for a newspaper is less than its former level and where further decline is expected in the absence of remedial efforts to revise the target market. The challenge of faltering demand is revitalization and the marketing task involves is remarketing. Remarketing implies starting a new life cycle and searching for new marketing programmes in terms of added value and packaging for a declining newspaper.
Only the media managers can say why they chose to remain secretive in the management of their businesses. I have searched for information on why a particular newspaper cannot report occurrences in other newspapers without discovering anything tangible. The report being discussed here can be either positive or negative. Indifference boils down to what can be termed as an espiris de corps. For example, some newspapers have three titled editors viz daily, Saturday and Sunday. Others settle for four titled editors viz: daily (Monday- Thursday), Friday, Saturday and Sunday. We have two titled editors (editor, daily and editor, weekend) in some newspapers. Online editor needs to be as good as a newspapers editor but in some media firms, a programmer is assigned to handle online edition thereby committing unpardonable mistakes. Analysis of these and more ought to have been done, situating the implications on the firms operations.
Editors and line editors are being sacked on a flimsy excuse and their colleagues lobby to take their positions. The same is applicable to the position of a Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief. In the history of Nigerian media, most of the present Managing Directors/Editor-in-Chiefs were former Editors. Just as some public office holders assumed duties without adequate preparations and prerequisite knowledge, ditto for some that are saddling with the management of the media firms. Managerial ability goes beyond, or is entirely different from professional competence. A man may be a guru in journalism or marketing or accounting or engineering, this does not make him a competent manager. The media managers need to go on a refresher course without further delay. Unfortunately, the time is fast running against them.
On April 12, 2020, Dr. Qasim Akinreti, the Chairman of Nigerian Union of Journalists, Lagos council issued a statement. It was titled: where are the friends of Lagos journalists”. The statement was issued amidst the heat that followed the recording of first case of corona virus in Lagos state on February 27, 2020. He wrote: It is rather unfortunate that corporate organizations have contributed to COVID-19 pandemic taskforce across the country and forget the journalists who announced and published the huge sums. The question is that what has the journalists done to deserve this lack of respect to self dignity and economic right?”
He stressed further on the challenges being faced by the practitioners. He said “The Champion newspapers owner, Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, a leading political figure and an industrialist is owing journalists in his stable over 64 months of salaries and other emoluments. Very disturbing, after he sold The Champion House, he could not pay off our members.
We are even shocked that one of the best union friendly newspapers in Nigeria, The Vanguard could not pay salaries for about 6 months now. The story of Thisday newspapers will shock everyone, with huge profits made by the company and expansion to other areas of media, salaries are not paid regularly until it is accumulated for months and later cleared.
Surely, the union is equally embarrassed that despite the huge profits from political coverage in the time past, currently, DAAR Communications cannot meet basic needs of our members. Today, some retired members of the DAAR Communications are in court to claim their entitlements. Today, many journalists have become veterans of poor status and suffering in silence. The retirement benefits of members in the Radio Lagos/Eko FM and Lagos Television are yet to be paid”.
He concluded by signing off with: Dear colleagues and opinion leaders, let us start a conversation on support for Nigerian journalists and more importantly Lagos Journalists which I proudly present, first on line of duty”.
Unfortunately, his public letter did not receive the expected media attention. Most media firms did not use the material in their medium, few used it as a brief and from an angle of palliatives to the journalists from the corporate bodies, in the inner pages.
Apparently, due to the poor coverage given to the public letter, Dr. Akinreti shared the letter on the Facebook page of Lagos NUJ Council. My comment was Journalists are pretty good at working the scene of a disaster. They will tell you what happened, who did it and why? But when it comes to the disaster engulfing their own profession, their analysis is less rigorous. An uncharacteristic haze characterizes a lot of the reporting and commentary on the issues raised by Dr Quasim Akinreti. Some newspapers did not publish his public letter and the electronic medium mentioned is yet to include it in its news bulletin.
Similar thing repeated itself when there were lay off, salary slash, forced leave in both print and electronic media in the first week of May 2020. Other journalists heard and saw no evil worthy to be reported. In my own opinion, the silence of the practitioners was not golden in this instance.
It will be recalled that in the 1990s, The Guardian newspaper reported happenings in the media firms but it has dropped the idea. At a point Lade Bonuola was writing on the grammatical errors committed by the media firms, Guardian newspapers inclusive. Majority of the media firms now have Brand and Marketing sections that can easily be used to report the media but the pages are being used to sing praises of the corporate bodies to the high heaven.
Till date, The Next, a newspaper that was founded in 2008 by Dele Olojede, an International award winning journalist broke the jinx. It had a section dedicated to the reportage of happenings in the other media. Specifically, it covered an event at The Punch nicely; it was about the forced resignation of the Executive Director, Publication over allegations of impropriety leveled against him by an Editor who had earlier been asked to resign, orchestrated by the same Director. This later resulted in the Executive Director being forced to stand down from the CNN Journalism award panel of judges. Ikechukwu Amaechi, The Niche publisher replaced the embattled Director. All the facts of all the sides were professionally presented by the newspaper and the reading public was fully aware of what led to what.
Also, iReports-ng, an online medium reported the same story. It was posted on March 4, 2010 in Business & Finance, Exclusive Reports at 7.13pm with the title: Dirty War Over Money Tears Punch Apart, as Editor Opens Can of Worms on Multi-Million Naira Corruption Scandal. It was a detailed report; the fourteen page petition by the concerned editor to the Chairman of The Punch was reproduced in its report.
Of late, media practitioners are asking for a bail out. Bail out for settlement of outstanding bills is a worst form of corruption; it should rather be used for an investment, otherwise, it remains morally irresponsible. Some media outfits are heavily indebted and millions of naira, if not billions of naira, may mean “nothing” to them. We may still come to this same sorry state after few months because the fund will just be used to settle arrears of salaries, gratuities of ex staff, litigation, unremitted tax deductions, unremitted deductions from cooperative societies, debts owed contractors, suppliers, etc.
The media firms should have a system that will aid the emergence of competent Managing Directors in place; this will put a stop to a situation where someone is being promoted to his own level of incompetence. Sequel to this, management must put in place a set of functions that are designed to attract, retain and motivate a competent employee in the company to higher level of result. Management team should have an ability to direct and lead effectively. It should influence workers so that they strive willingly to accomplish company goals and objectives. In this situation, strategy by osmosis would have been completely eliminated.
In conclusion, all those news that appear on the cover pages of the newspapers are happening in nearly all the media firms and they are not being reported in whatever form. For example, many state governors are not paying workers salaries promptly; media celebrated the non payment. Unfortunately, some media firms are equally in arrears of salaries. Equally, pension fund was borrowed by government at different levels to pay workers, media reported it on their cover pages and majority of these media firms is neck-deep in using cooperative deductions to pay salaries without remitting accordingly. The list is endless!
Finally, it has to be made known that journalism is too big to be left in the hands of journalists alone as no staff is indispensable. Media needs to watch itself; who will watch the watcher?
Ayankunbi, MD/CEO, AbingMO3 Marketing Management Consultancy.
08023051315
abiolaayankunbi@yahoo.com
