By Chibuike Nwabuko
Abuja (Sundiata Post) – Association of Communication Schools & Professionals Of Nigeria, ACSPN, has called for the establishment of a Nigerian fact-checking platform, akin to “Tin eye” to help fight fake news.
The association made the call at its workshop in Abuja recently with the theme: “Fake News”.
President/CEO of AfriHub Group, Prof Manny Aniebonam in his keynote address, said that “fake news dominate real news and that journalists do not bother to check the fact”. Headlines are deliberately manipulated especially by the bloggers whose main aim is to attract traffic to their site, he added.
Prof Aniebonam who said that “media literacy is the strategy to combat fake news, called for the establishment of a Nigerian fact-checking platform which will score; news item, news operators/bloggers.
The CEO of AfriHub called for sanction for fake news as according to him, fake news can cause world war and therefore should not be treated with kids glove.
In his contribution, the Director, International Institute of Journalism, Dr. Immam Shehu explained that though technology drives the news but technology is always ahead of law while the law tries to catch up.
He insisted that “the necessary thing to do is to apply the rules; rules cannot change no matter the level of technological advancement”. The Director who lamented the failure of gate-keeping, called for convergence of sanction.
Journalists were advised to ensure that fake news does not get into their outlets. That “though social media has popularized fake news, but that fake news is not new”.
Seasoned journalists were tasked to own the media by ensuring that news they let out are checked.