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Haroun Adamu, former chairman of the Petroleum Trust Fund and chairman of the Realnews Sixth Anniversary Lecture, in his welcome remarks, states how influential the Realnews and other online media outlets can be as a major opinion shaper and influencer
By Haroun Adamu
When Maureen invited me to chair this great occasion, which is the sixth in the series, I found it difficult to make up an excuse to deny myself the great opportunity to learn. Having been a part of a generation of journalists that are now considered dinosaurs, or analogue, in today’s digital world, what Maureen and her colleagues are doing with Realnews is completely alien to me and my ilk. I find the amalgamation of technology and news, to be completely fascinating and consider myself lucky to be a witness to this disruption if I may borrow a well-known term used to describe the revolution and tremor caused by Realnews and their colleagues.
Online publishing is now in the ascendancy and is being propelled by the growth of social media and its various platforms. There is no stronger evidence of this, than in evaluating the impact of social media in teleguiding the minds, hearts and ultimately the fingers of voters in achieving a desired outcome for those who via their laptops craft targeted messages and disseminate these messages to the populace.
I would like to share with you some statistics: – globally – internet penetration is measured at 54.4%, Africa has an internet penetration of 35.2%. in 2000, Nigeria had 200,000 internet users, by the end of 2017 that number rose to 98,391,456 that’s almost a 50,000% increase. We (Nigeria) have a 50% internet penetration. By the end of 2017, 17,000,000 million Nigerians were on Facebook. In May of this year, the Manager of Facebook’s Developer Program stated that there are 26,000,000 Nigerians on Facebook. I guess this amongst many other reasons, must have been the reason behind Facebook’s founder – Mark Zuckerberg’s visit to Nigeria.
Both Facebook and Google have opened offices in Nigeria. I think this speaks volumes as to where we fit in their global plans. I can only imagine, that as data cost continue to drop due to competition from telecommunication companies, and cost of smartphones go south, this number could easily double in the next five years. A simple extrapolation tells us that there are potentially, 98 million Nigerians who with a click of a button in either a bus, their offices or bedrooms can access Realnews website, and more glaring is that 26 million of those Nigerians can be reached via one social media platform alone.
A little food for thought – the newspaper with the most circulation sells approximately 100,000 copies daily. This clearly shows how influential the Realnews and other online media outlets can be and as such they are a major opinion shaper and influencer.
The Business Model adopted by Realnews is very forward thinking and can be described as being ahead of the curve. The team must continue to strive to remain dynamic, flexible and willing to adapt as the environment evolve and mutates with advances in technology particularly in artificial Intelligence. This disruption of the old media – which I belonged to until Maureen initiated me into the new age, will be doing all they can to close the gap and this is where the core values and mission of Realnews would differentiate them from the pack.
Their mission which in summary wishes them to:- Become the cornerstone of investigative journalism in Nigeria and Africa, be a change agent in the Nigerian social and political landscape, focus on key sectors of our economy while giving a voice to the silent majority groups; fight injustice and be in front of the charge to defend basic human right in building a better society.
Additionally, it creates a larger moral burden of responsibility on the Realnews team, as its credibility and authenticity would determine how traffic is attracted to its site. I am pleasantly aware that Realnews reporters were either nominees and or recipients of several media awards from the prestigious Nigeria Media Merit Awards. Several reporters were nominated in the last decade in various categories, such as oil and gas, defense, power and columnist of the year.
Being familiar with the rigor in the selection process of those who made the cut, and went on to become winners, I can attest to the quality that resides in Realnews; as I am a founding member of the Board of Trustees of the Nigerian Media Merit Award and still serve on the Board. I urge the management to continue all efforts to attract and retain its talents as the talents will always drive the business.
Our gathering this morning, testifies to this effort, as it marks its sixth year of providing a unique platform for the exchange of ideas and networking opportunities for reporters, intellectuals, public servants, corporate executives and media men and women to galvanise sector decision makers to favour the voiceless and the down trodden to fight for any form of injustice and inequality.
The lecture series was established according to Realnews “to celebrate the best minds in our society and tap into their repository of knowledge to enrich the discourse on national development.
Today, we have as our guest speaker an intellectual and administrator, Professor Mahmood Yakubu who has the unenviable task of shepherding nearly one hundred political parties from which Nigerians will elect our next president. It will be a privilege to listen to him as he dissects issues which participants will raise. I commend Realnews’ reach and willingness to expend its goodwill and capital in gathering such an elite group of erudite scholars and administrators to pontificate and lead in the important topic.
It is therefore a privilege to be considered to chair this conference.
I wish us all happy deliberations.
Thank You.
*Being the text of the Welcome Address presented by Dr. Haroun Al-Rashid Adamu at the Sixth Anniversary lecture of Realnews held at Sheraton Hotel, Ikeja, Lagos, Thursday, November 15, 2018
– Nov. 16, 2018 @ 21:20 GMT |
Tags: Why Realnews is Ahead of the Curve
