ABUJA – An environmental activist, Mr Hamzat Lawal, has called on the Federal Government to mainstream environment in all sectors of the economy to enhance the nation’s development.
Lawal said this in Abuja on Tuesday in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), after a two-day workshop for investigative and environment reporters.
He said that environment should be an integral part of all sectors of the economy to ensure climate-smart policies and programmes.
The activist said that Nigeria needed to give enough attention to environmental sustainability for meaningful growth to be recorded in all fields of human endeavour.
Lawal, who is the Chief Executive, Connected Development (CODE), an NGO, urged journalists to acquire skills in investigative reporting.
“The stage we are in now, we need concrete information so that people can be better informed.
“Journalists need concrete information that can make sense to policy makers, NGOs and activists for them to work with. [eap_ad_2] “They (journalists) need information that can help parliamentarians to make good policies that will affect lives and transform the lives of the citizens,’’ he said.
Lawal said that CODE co-hosted the workshop with African Network of Centres for Investigative Reporting (ANCIR) to equip journalists with forensic skills to interrogate interviewees.
He said investigative journalism needed a lot of patience, and urged journalists to always cross-check their facts before publishing their reports.
“You need to cross-check your facts with different sources and it takes a lot of resources to do so.
“ We understand that our media organisations do not have enough resources to do such investigations to support their story lines.
“Now you have other measures you can take your stories from, you do not need to travel far to do investigation, you can build network of experts and work with them.’’
Also speaking, Mr Heinrich Bohmke, the resources person, described cross-examination as a science used by the legal profession to sift truth from lies.
“Although widely used by prosecutors and forensic investigators, journalists have seldom been trained to use these simple techniques and tools,’’ he said. (NAN)[eap_ad_3]
