Noah Ebije, Kaduna
Journalists practising in Kaduna State have been charged to ensure that their reports before, during and after the 2019 general elections are accurate and fair, without leading to loss of lives and property.
Executive Vice Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer of Kaduna State Peace Commission, Mrs. Priscilla Yachat Ankut, gave the charge in her opening remarks at a one-day workshop on “Conflict, Sensitive Reporting Workshop for Journalists in Kaduna State” held on Friday.
The workshop was organised by the Peace Commission in partnership with the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD).
“We are here to learn and I hope at the end of the day, our contributions will prove those predicting doom during the elections in Kaduna State wrong.
“We will make sure the elections come and go, and we won’t lose any lives; we don’t destroy property in Kaduna,” she advised.
She said the commission had been working in Kaduna for one year, with the core mandate of promoting peaceful coexistence in Kaduna State.
“We are getting more organised and systematic in our approach as we understand the environment better.
“We have met political parties in December and asked if they could conduct themselves peacefully, and we got them to accept and behave themselves; we decided to form a small committee to monitor the campaigns to see who is defaulting,” she said.
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Speaking further, she said that one of the things they did at the inaugural meeting, impacted on the NUJ representative who later met her and requested for training for journalists.
“He told me that it should not end here, but we should hold training for journalists, and we reached out to our friends at HD, because they have deeper pockets than us and so every logistics for this meeting is facilitated by HD,” she disclosed.
In her remarks, Zigwai Ayuba from HD, said that so far, HD had been able to reduce the level of crisis in the five LGAs in Kaduna where they are focusing on.
“Through the peace accord that was signed, we have been able to reduce cases of violence recorded in the five LGAs: Sanga, Kaura, Kachia, Zango Kataf and Jema’a,” she said.
Zigwai explained that HD mediates dialogue during crisis, by involving communities, bringing them together to discuss and embrace peaceful means of crisis resolution.