Media 961, a monitoring outfit of the Muslim Students’ Society of Nigeria (MSSN), Lagos State chapter, last Saturday, joined journalists worldwide to celebrate the World Press Freedom Day.
Students from higher institutions in Lagos state came together to mark the day.
A statement from the outfit’s Director, Abdurrasheed Abubakar, condemned sustained attacks on journalists globally.
Media, he said, is an important instrument of change in every society.
He said: “Apart from informing the general public on events and issues that affects them, the media is a significant force in modern-day culture. As a result, the United Nations General Assembly in 1993 proclaimed May 3 as the World Press Freedom Day.
“A Day meant to celebrate the fundamental principles of press freedom; evaluate press freedom around the world; defend the media from attacks on their independence and to pay tribute to journalists who lost their lives in the exercise of their profession, among others.
“It is an undeniable fact that the world today is currently experiencing a turbulent period like never before. The unfortunate events around us are enough to cite as examples. Thousands of innocent people have lost their lives, our media colleagues, who were only doing their job, have met their death, leaving behind wives, children, parents and siblings.
“As we celebrate this year’s World Press Freedom Day, let us remind you that majority of our colleagues are currently incarcerated in different countries innocently, most of them without access to lawyers. They have not committed any offence, other than discharging their duties dutifully. We have many cases, but the predicament of journalists in Egypt is very pathetic.”
The Muslim students also called for immediate release of detained Al-Jazeera journalists by Egyptian authorities.
Peter Greste, Abdullah Shami, Mohamed Fahmy and Baher Mohamed have been in detention for the past 126 days.
Abubakar added: “They have appeared seven times in court for doing their statutory role. We want to emphatically state that journalists are not criminals. It is the fundamental rights of the people to know, and it is the responsibility of the media to give them the most objective and unbiased information. Hence, we demand for the immediate release of these reporters and others journalists who are going through the same treatment in other part of the world.”
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, over 500 reporters have been in prison worldwide in the last two years. The International Federation of Journalists reported that 105 media workers were killed in 2013.
The group added: “While extremist groups in crisis-ridden regions have been behind a good numbers of these injustice meted on our colleagues, in certain cases, government officials, even the allied forces with the United States of America are culpable.
“Back home in Nigeria, we are hitherto ranked among socially responsible media in the world, yet our leadership has failed to address problems bedeviling media industry, one of which is poor welfare package.
“How do you expect journalists to feed their families when they are poorly paid or when they were not paid their wages for months? Facts have shown that we are among the worst remunerated in the world, yet we don’t want them to become subjective! In Nigeria, most journalists live on the gratifications they receive from people, even their editors, yet we say it’s unethical.
“We use this day to call on the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ) to see the welfare of journalists, dead or alive, as a priority, and work with media owners on how to effect a standard wage for the practitioners to live good and happy life, so that, together, we can put an end to all forms of unethical practices among other members
