United Nations Women Country Representative to Nigeria and ECOWAS, Ms. Beatrice Eyong, has enjoined Nigerian media executives and editors to give women journalists similar opportunities as their male colleagues.
“Female journalists should be given opportunities to cover diverse subjects from politics to business, science, sports, and technology, while encouraging male journalists to also cover diverse issues, including women’s rights and gender equality stories,” she said at a National dialogue on Gender Responsive Reporting held in Lagos, Nigeria between September 1 and 2, 2020.
Eyong further charged the media to “champion women’s rights and gender equality issues through editorial articles, features, and news coverage; and adopt a gender-sensitive Code of Conduct on Reporting.”
Women Radio CEO and founder, Toun Okewale-Sonaiya appealed to media executives to consider a 50:50 approach to increase the number of women used as guests, analysts, commentators, speakers with an ultimate aim of a 50:50 representations of women and men contributors at news gathering and reporting stages. She urged for primetime features of Women on Television and Radio stations and on prominent spaces, including front pages in newspapers and magazines to report women more.
Speaking on the Trends and Issues in Media Coverage of Women at Elections, Lanre Arogundade of the International Press Centre, noted that the voices of women and other marginalised stakeholders should be adequately reflected and accorded as much visibility and prominence as equal stakeholders in the society.
National Information Officer, United Nations Information Centre (UNIC), Oluseyi Soremekun, drew participants’ attention to unconscious gender bias and charged the journalists to avoid stereotypical comments and generalizations in their reports. “When journalists do not understand how bias works, they are less likely to identify it in themselves and their reports; and also less likely to come to fair and accurate decisions,” he added.
Executive Director, Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism, Motunrayo Alaka, presented the ‘RUSH’ model: Report Until Something Happens to underscore the need for journalists to follow up on gender-based stories until justice is served.
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