Media has the power to shape perception of the society about anything. Its framing, whether international or not, will go a long way in affecting either negatively or not how the society treats or accept the entity.

A number of African journalists (34 in all) from different media houses across Africa have been selected as Centre for Disability and Inclusion Africa to be trained on professional ways to report. This initiative was inaugurated after a survey that revealed capacity gaps of journalists in this specialized reporting. This project was done in collaboration with Africa Foundation for Young Media Professionals,

These journalists were selected after a rigorous call for application and shortlisting process that lasted for about three weeks.   These fellows will go through hybrid training and mentorship sessions as well as story writing and news gatherings ethics around Disability and inclusion reporting son they can all add value to this crucial beat that is missing in many of the newsrooms.

Some of the journalists selected

Disability and inclusion reporting, raising the voices of the marginalized in the society is funded by Africa Foundation for Young Media professionals with support from MacArthur Foundation through CMEDIA Project led by WOle Soyinjka Centre for Investigative Journalism

Since there is no justice or inclusive society without diversity, it has become important for the media not to leave behind over a billion humans with disabilities around the world. Today we found out that the media is not given attention to disability and inclusion issues. The problem is, most media houses do not have data to write great story or do not understand the urgency associated with leaving this huge population behind.”” Yinka Olaito, Executive director of Africa Foundation for Young Media Professionals said in his release.

Yinka Olaito leading a session during the training

“Africa Has its own larger share of these one Billion People so there is an urgent need for the media to be empowered to do its job in this area. This has created a need for African journalists to rise up to this challenge and someone must stand up to equip them for ethical professional coverage of this. Hence the institution of this fellowship.

The beneficiaries of this six months’ fellowship are from Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, Democratic Republic of Congo etc

The training which used hybrid method held in Ibadan and Abuja Nigeria.

Watch media coverage of the event here