Diamond Publications Limited

NIGERIA`S MEDIA WATCHDOG
Diamond Publications Limited is a dynamic publishing company that has distinguished itself in magazine and book publishing since its incorporation in 1989. Its main products are focused on the Nigerian media.

In the News

The World of photojournalists
Being a photo-editor is one of the toughest jobs in the newsroom. The position is a combination of many occupations rolled into one: photographer, editor, reporter, lab technician, graphic artist and team leader.

Whereas newsrooms around the world differ in shapes and sophistication as well as in the number of people that work there, the intensity which the photo editor works is the same everywhere.

As photographers, they go out to take photographs for their publications. In doing these, they also provide information on what the pictures they have taken are all about by captioning them. As head of the photo-section, they assign their subordinates to follow reporters who have assignments to cover. After the assignments, they discuss with their subordinates and other editorial staff how the photographs will run in their newspapers. Which of the photographs taken would be used? Will it be the main photo on the page? Can it run on the front page? Does the photo need to be cropped? Or are there any questions about the caption information that the photojournalist provided? ... | Read more

Headline News

Media World Year Book 2008/2009 out soon

New President for NGE in June

Kaduna Upgrades radio stations

UNN launches three local papers

U.S. Consulate Celebrates World Press Freedom Day

Highlights

PR has come a long way

Nn'emeka Maduegbuna, chairman and CEO C & F Porter Novelli, is undoubtedly an authority when issues relating to public relations are discussed in Nigeria. He is not only the chairman of the Public Relations Consultants Association of Nigeria (PRCAN) but also one of the leading lights in the nation's budding public relations practice and consultancy. He started as a broadcast journalist before delving in to PR. A Fellow of the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations (NIPR), he read mass communication at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. In this interview with MR's Femi Babatunde, he proffered solutions to some of the knotty issues in the industry.

The Media and Corruption in Africa

When I mention the subject of this talk to friends, they ask me straight away, “Isn't that a rather dangerous subject on which to put your head above the parapet?” And next - are you talking about media handling of the issue of corruption, or is it about the corruption of and in the media? I could only answer that I have to treat both. In Africa, investigative journalism has not been well developed, in part because of the power of government, which can both influence and intimidate. If I can begin to draw here on my experience in West Africa, let me identify at least two independent newspaper operators who helped to bring down regimes that were, it is true democratic, and partly multi-party regimes.

BUSINESS REPORTING

CADBURY: A failure of investigative reporting
The Cadbury fraud story had all the ingredients of a big scandal. It is arguably the biggest fraud ever to hit the Nigerian capital market. A multinational company, people in positions of trust and authority, huge sums of money and allegations of financial impropriety are enough to fill the pages of newspapers for weeks. Yet, there was (and still is) an awful lack of will or interest on the part of the press to investigate the scam...| Read more

LITERATURE REVIEW

50 Years of Things Fall Apart: Media blitz and the glories of Nigerian Literature
The entire world, from the Americas to Europe and Africa through Asia and Australia, apparently cannot have enough of the golden celebrations scattered all over the globe of the epochal novel, “Things Fall Apart” published by a precocious Chinua Achebe at age 28 in 1958. Nelson Mandela remarkably said that the book literally broke the prison walls while he was in jail in Robben Island. Things Fall Apart has broken all kinds of barriers and launched modern African writing into the mainstream of world literature. The book has been translated into some 50 world languages and inspired statesmen, publishers, teachers, writers and general readers all over the world. It was on the strength of the book that Heinemann UK launched the canon-breaking African Writers Series (AWS) in 1962, and Things Fall Apart alone accounted for 80 percent of the sales of the entire series. The book has sold over 10 million copies, being without question the number one bestselling book out of Africa...| Read more

KUDOS & KNOCKS

KUDOS & KNOCKS
Knock to Murhi TV for allowing one of its presenters, Segun Adisa, run foul of the Nigerian Press Organisation (NPO) Code of Ethics on minors.
Adisa in his programme, Labe Orun, a Yoruba programme, on Sunday, April 26, not only showed the faces of three girls allegedly raped by their teacher, but also went ahead to mention their names and interview them.
MITV and Adisa should take a look at the Code of Ethics for the profession adopted by the NPO in March 1988. Article 9 on children and minors says: “A journalist should not identify, either by name or picture or interview minors who are involved in cases concerning sexual offences, crimes and rituals or witchcraft either as victims, witness or defendant”. The idea behind this directive is to protect minors from avoidable stigma in the eye of the public... | Read more

PUBLICATION OF THE MONTH

EDITORIALS

The beleaguered FOI Bill

The Freedom of Information (FOI) Bill suffered another major set-back in its tortuous journey to becoming an Act of the National Assembly. Members of the House of Representatives voted against immediate consideration of the bill by a committee of the whole House, and opted instead to take up the bill at an unspecified date.
We believe that the position of the House of Representatives is untenable. Expectations had been high that the current class of federal lawmakers would readily appreciate the advertised importance of the bill, and therefore fast-track its passage. But such high expectations would appear to have been misplaced... |Read more