[afro-nets] Training on Public Health Journalism in Nigeria

[Media Resource Advocacy Centre <mracnigeria@yahoo.com>]

Training on Public Health Journalism in Nigeria
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PRESS RELEASE
February 11, 2005

VOA To Open New Kano Reporting Center,
Host Health Reporting Workshop for Female Journalists

KANO, NIGERIA - The Voice of America, which reaches listeners in
northern Nigeria through its Hausa language service, is offi-
cially launching a new Kano Reporting Center (KRC) in conjunc-
tion with a health-reporting workshop for women journalists.

The official opening coincides with a four-day workshop for fe-
male journalists to be led by Development Communications Net-
work, the leading public health and science journalism training
organization in Nigeria. More than a dozen Nigerian women jour-
nalists are participating in the workshop focusing on health re-
porting and covering issues including HIV/AIDS, polio, tubercu-
losis, leprosy, malaria and other epidemics. The training from
February 13 to 18 is a follow-up to earlier partnership between
VOA and Development Communications Network on public health
journalism. The KRC will be opened officially at a ribbon-
cutting ceremony on Feb. 16, 2005. Officials from VOA, USAID and
the Kano government are expected to attend, a release from the
VOA stated.

The KRC, funded through an agreement with the U.S. Agency for
International Development's (USAID) Nigeria mission, is a digi-
tal broadcasting facility that allows VOA's Hausa Service to
broadcast a weekly, health-oriented youth radio program, Karamin
Sani (Little Knowledge is a Danger), from the largest city in
the region. Reporters can also file news and information from
the KRC with state-of-the-art equipment.

"We're very excited about this new center, which will help us
provide important and timely information about health issues and
other topics to our Hausa-speaking audiences," said David Jack-
son, the VOA director. "We want the KRC to be a beehive of ac-
tivity - for both broadcasting and training."

Doctors and health officials will brief the journalists at the
workshop in sessions, which will also feature practical advice
on issues such as finding the human angle and myths and miscon-
ceptions about reporting disease.

Among the team trainers are Hajia Bilkisu Yusuf, a leading jour-
nalist and the president of the Federation of Muslim Women Asso-
ciation in Nigeria; Cece Fadope, country director for Internews
and Akin Jimoh, program director for Development Communications
Network. Also present will be Sunday Dare, chief of VOA's Hausa
Service.

Under an Inter-Agency Agreement, USAID/Nigeria provided VOA/IBB
(through its parent agency, the Broadcasting Board of Governors)
$310,000 in FY 2003-2004 to support health and educational pro-
gramming for VOA's Hausa service. Besides the KRC, the VOA has
conducted reporting on numerous health issues, including
HIV/AIDS and polio, and conducted call-in programs and general
health forums.

VOA's Hausa Service, which began in 1979, has a strong presence
in northern Nigeria where millions of people listen to the pro-
gram weekly. Some 50 million people, predominantly in Nigeria
but also in Niger, Ghana and Cameroon, speak Hausa. The service
broadcasts 90 minutes daily, Monday through Friday, and one-hour
on Saturdays and Sundays.

Devcoms is a media based public health journalism training and
science communication organization with extensive network of
journalists in developing countries. The organization mission is
public understanding of science and health-related research
through appropriate communication strategies for health promo-
tion, scientific literacy, policy development and program imple-
mentation. Devcoms mission is carried out through three ap-
proaches namely capacity building for journalists; fostering me-
dia, scientist, NGO/development sector partnership; and public
health education and promotion.

--
Tesa Anota
Project Coordinator
Media Resource and Advocacy Centre (MRAC)
a project of Development Communications (Devcoms) Network
26 Adebola Street Off Adeniran Ogunsanya Street
Surulere, Lagos, Nigeria
Tel: +234-1-7748397, +234-803-3053-713
mailto:mracnigeria@yahoo.com