The National Orientation Agency (NOA) has encouraged media professionals to introduce probing of manifestoes of aspiring political office holders as part of their responsibilities to redirect the country from the path of frivolous and unkept promises.
The Director General of the agency, Malam Lanre Issa-Onilu gave the task while speaking as a panelist at the 9th annual conference of the Guild of Corporate Online Publishers (GOCOP), with the theme, “Reconciling Campaign Promises with Governance Realities: Challenges and Prospect,” held in Lagos.
He pointed out that some of the so-called manifestos were not originally from those who presented them but the party they belonged to, and they ended up subscribing to such manifestos.
He stressed that, as media professionals, this should be probed.
“Some people proposed manifestos which are not theirs, but party manifestos. They end up subscribing to their party manifestos. As journalists, we do not question manifestos but populate airtime and media space with other things.”
He equally pointed out that the manifesto of the federal government was the manifesto that governed Lagos state, explaining that the National Orientation Agency(NOA) was to communicate government projects.
The Director General added that government required value documentation, recalling that before he joined the agency, he was among those who said it should be scrapped, but when he got there, he discovered that the staff members there were committed.
“Before I went to NOA. I was among those who said it should be scrapped. It is not the Agency’s problem but a Nigerian problem. When I got there, I discovered that the staff members there are committed.
“I am an agency under a Ministry. There is the problem of the need to have them buy into what I want to do. I am lucky to get the support of the president who is interested in the unity of the country’, he stated.
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