Beyond Election Day: How The Media Can Ensure Good Governance

The moment you understand that election day is just like a final day of a ritual, you will know the most is done before and after the election. In a country with a population over 150 million, the advancement should not be too late. Yet, I feel like we are not ready for conversations like this.

So much hope lies in the ballot that most people who never voted for the power that be feels like; “Those who voted for him should have been left to bear the brunt now.“ Well we are not here to play the game of who is to blame today.

In fact, the basis of this write up goes beyond what the voting masses feel or think. Like the saying “Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Corruption is well rooted in the history of politics and insofar as we are to talk about politics, we can’t rule out corruption—especially in a country like Nigeria.

What role do we now have to play as journalists? What is the Media’s job in ensuring that the masses have the best hands to lead it? 

For sanity to reign, the media has a crucial role to play, which cut across accountability, Combating information disorder, fostering investigative reporting and many more are the role of the media. Scary.

Yes! Journalism is what we choose. And else you intend to mount another pedestal, you have to do it all: tell the government of the abandoned Sanyinna healthcare, expose the illegal levy charged by bandits in Tsafe, empower voices, make impacts. And if you die while doing your job, consider yourself a hero who sacrificed himself for society’s common good. 

For a community to thrive, Journalism has to function. Like Darken Rahl in Legend of the Seeker; corruption is the work of the government.

Journalists are Seekers of the truth whose sword (pen) lies the hope of common man. As watchdogs, the world looks up to us, to the world we will build, to the impacts we will make. The world looks up to the press for freedom from the dark.