IPCL to host ICT media empowerment

Image and Publics Communications Limited (IPCL), has finalized plans to host Information and Communication Technology (ICT) alongside other business-related empowerment for Nigeria media practitioners, in Makurdi, the capital city of Benue State.

Executive Director, IPCL, Mr. Segun Oruame, made this disclosure at the weekend and said that over 50 media practitioners are expected to grace the three-day event.

The training session, he said, is targeted at junior and mid level practitioners drawn from the ICT, business, news and political beats.

Oruame quoted the Benue State Commissioner for Information, Dr. Diana Ochoga, as saying that he always regard media as stakeholders whose role is crucial to build a great Nigeria.

He also said that plans have been advanced to have the support of the National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP), stressing that part of the objectives of the training include to provide foundation knowledge for new concepts and evolving notions in journalism and modern journalistic practice; induct ICT and business journalists on the nuances on business and technology writing; refresh journalists knowledge on industry and best practice; and create a meeting point for media and industry; provide a shared platform for knowledge interaction and skill updating on news handling and news reporting.

“We are driven by the need to help fill the vacuum for capacity training so as to promote excellence in media delivery and journalistic practice,” Oruame said.

Further, he said, that since 2006, IPCL through its Media Training Centre has carried out series of capacity training workshops for journalists, which is consistent with its goals to improve the practice of the profession.

Recalling that the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) was a lead sponsor of its 2008 training for journalists in Ogun State, he noted that IPCL yearly brings together seasoned practitioners and experts from related fields to improve the knowledge base of active and practicing journalists.

The session, he said, would cover areas such as citizen journalism and the changing patterns of traditional journalism; blogging and the challenges of online reporting, just as the forum would examine notions such as developmental journalism within the context of reporting national institutions or issues that centre on national interest.

According to him, the training module provides a window for reporting technology based issues within the dynamics of the country’s changing laws as it concerns online financial services and libel on online publications.

Benue State current government is led by Governor Gabriel Suswam, who hitherto was appointed the Chairman, Anambra State Ward Congresses Committee of the PDP by the national secretariat of the party.

In the last two years, the governor has embarked on some of the country’s most aggressive rural electrification projects and has sought to the window for agriculture beyond subsistence farming through establishment of support infrastructures among other incentives to attract investment including a 48-hour cap on land title issuing and tax holidays of up to five years.

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