Speaker

Lagos, Nigeria July 1, 2017
Wanted: Data Smart Journalists

Nigeria has signed Freedom of Information Bill in 2011 which makes data open and more accessible to Nigerian journalists.
But most newsroom have not trained their journalists to take advantage of this law effectively by mining available data and finding stories in them.
Thus majority of the stories published or broadcast are broadly anecdotal and lacks credibility.
The inability of media organisations to tell compelling stories backed by available data has weakened media business in Nigeria for many has lost their audience to foreign media.
It is time to incorporate data training into the curriculum of journalism schools in the country.