EJS Centre, IPC Urge Nigerian Media to Promote Fair Coverage of Women Leaders Ahead of 2027
As the political season gathers pace, media practitioners have been urged to go beyond routine coverage of women and focus more deliberately on women in public leadership, highlighting their...
As the political season gathers pace, media practitioners have been urged to go beyond routine coverage of women and focus more deliberately on women in public leadership, highlighting their qualifications and contributions, especially in the country’s critical sectors.
Media practitioners and journalists received the charge during a three-day interactive dialogue on gender-sensitive reporting and media coverage of women in public leadership, organised by the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (EJS) Presidential Centre for Women and Development, Liberia, in partnership with the International Press Centre (IPC).
Themed “Reporting on Leaders: See Her, Hear Her, Cover Her—Nigeria Edition,” the programme brought together about 35 media stakeholders, including editors, journalists, media gatekeepers, and other key actors, to examine how the media shapes public perceptions of women in leadership. It also highlighted the media’s crucial role in elevating women in leadership and politics in Nigeria, despite the country’s low levels of female representation.
At the event, International Press Centre Executive Director Lanre Arogundade said the meeting should give media professionals a platform to exchange ideas on fresh approaches to gender reporting, rather than treat it as just another training programme.
Arogundade highlighted IPC’s longstanding commitment to promoting gender-sensitive journalism, noting that gender issues have remained central to the organisation’s work since its establishment.
Mr Arogundade reiterated that IPC had published a booklet on the union rights of female journalists as far back as 2001 and had continued to build women journalists’ capacity through various training programmes. He added that IPC has long been at the forefront of gender-focused journalism training, including election-period programmes on fact-checking and conflict-sensitive reporting.
Arogundade, who has worked extensively in Liberia since around 2002, said his post-civil war experiences there reinforced his belief that the media must do more to report on issues affecting women.
Speaking about former Liberian President and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Arogundade recalled the prejudices that surrounded her political leadership and stressed the need for fair media coverage of women seeking public office.
Arogundade said the media also has a responsibility to report political and electoral processes impartially, helping create space for more women to participate in leadership.
“We should also be doing impartial reporting of the political and electoral processes to pave the way for the election of more women,” he said.
Speaking on the initiative that birthed the programme, Communications Lead of the EJS Presidential Centre, Noëlla Ngunyam, said the initiative was not about asking journalists to be sympathetic to women but about ensuring fairness and consistency in the coverage of women and men in public leadership by making women’s matters the centrepiece of conversations to give them visibility.
She said women leaders should be subjected to the same standards of accountability as men while urging journalists to avoid focusing unnecessarily on issues such as a woman’s marital status, number of children, or reproductive history when those issues were irrelevant to her public role.
“We are not here to ask you to be kind to women. We are asking you to be fair, to be consistent, and to cover women leaders as much as you cover men leaders,” Ngunyam said.
She said the media played a critical role in determining who was recognised as a leader and whether such individuals were perceived as credible. Ngunyam said Nigeria’s low level of women’s political representation made the conversation particularly important.
Ms Ngunyam further maintained that the platform was meant to have some directing conversation and break the usual bias and stereotypes that can undermine the presence of women’s representation in the political atmosphere of Nigeria.
Speaking to the existing data during the session showed that women remain significantly underrepresented in Nigeria’s political leadership, with women accounting for only a small proportion of members of the National Assembly.
She also drew attention to Nigeria’s 35 percent affirmative-action commitment for women, noting the gap between policy commitments and actual representation.
Ngunyam said the media should therefore examine how its own reporting practices could contribute to changing the narrative around women in leadership.
“Data is not our fault. As journalists, as media people, and as watchdogs, the numbers are not our fault. What we do with the numbers, that is what concerns us,” she said.
She challenged journalists to examine what they had done throughout their careers to project women and their achievements.
In her goodwill message on behalf of the Guild of Corporate Online Publishers (GOCOP), Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Supernews Online, Ngozi Onyeakusi, said professional journalism remained important in an era where social media had made it possible for almost anyone to publish information online.
She said GOCOP was committed to professionalism, ethical journalism, and the promotion of women within the online publishing industry, adding that the Guild also promoted mentorship, networking, professional development, and recognition of women journalists while advocating for the welfare and safety of media practitioners.
She urged journalists to maintain professional standards and ensure that information published online could be verified and trusted.
Speaking on the role of the women journalists body, Chairperson of the National Association of Women Journalists (NAWOJ) Lagos State Chapter, Mrs Jumoke Falayi-Johnson, said the organisation had been loud in celebrating and promoting women across different sectors, rather than limiting its focus to women within journalism.
She questioned the limited presence of women on major television breakfast programmes, arguing that women should be invited to discuss a broader range of national issues rather than being predominantly associated with subjects such as childcare and breastfeeding.
She said sustained coverage of women’s achievements and leadership would help shift public conversations away from irrelevant personal questions when women eventually seek political office.
Speaking during the first-day panel session, which was moderated by Mr Arogundade, the panellists, Mrs Motunrayo Alaka, the Executive Director of the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism, Toun Okewale Sonaiya, the founder of Women Radio, and Ms Funke Treasure, a reputable broadcaster, called for proper engagement with women even if they seem to be avoiding the media and the spotlight.
In their joint submission, they noted that religion and culture are the biggest elephants in the room, as they limit women’s participation in leadership. They therefore called for institutional responses to help women reach critical leadership positions in Nigeria.
They also encouraged the leaders of media houses and newsrooms to use their platforms to make the small issues of women bigger through active projection and reflections on the positive sides of women. They also called for agenda-setting that will push women forward for important positions in the country.
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