Mr Joel Ahofodji, ECOWAS Director of Communication.
The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has called on journalists to strengthen efforts to counter electoral disinformation and promote credible information across West Africa through their reportage.
Mr Joel Ahofodji, ECOWAS Director of Communication, made the call at a two-day capacity-building workshop for journalists on Tuesday in Lagos.
Ahofodji, represented by Mr Francis Chukwu-Emeka of the Communication Directorate, said credible information was critical to strengthening democracy, public trust, peace and security across the West African region.
He said misinformation, disinformation and manipulated digital content increasingly threatened democratic institutions and public confidence, particularly during elections.
According to him, generative Artificial Intelligence has made it easier to create convincing fake images, videos, audio recordings and narratives.
He said ECOWAS was strengthening its response through the ECOWAS disinformation working group, capacity-building programmes and national misinformation response mechanisms.
Ahofodji said the commission had trained more than 500 journalists across 12 member states in fact-checking, open-source intelligence, digital verification and media literacy.
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The commission’s spokesman appealed to journalists to always make verification an uncompromising professional standard, particularly when reporting elections, political transitions and security developments.
He said collaboration among journalists, fact-checkers, Wikipedia editors and information integrity practitioners was essential to strengthening democracy, peace and regional stability.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the workshop was held under the theme: “Strengthening Electoral Information Integrity through Responsible Journalism, Fact-Checking and Wikipedia.”
It was organised by ECOWAS in collaboration with the Foundation for the Internationalisation of Public Administrations (FIAP), a Spanish public sector organisation that works to improve public systems and democratic governance globally. (NAN)
