MD FIDELITY BANK'S SPEECH AT THE NIGERIAN BLOGGERS FAIR

MD FIDELITY, IHEJIAHI REGINALD

Dear  Friends,

I am very delighted to welcome you to this event marking the end of the Nigerian Bloggers Fair 2013. As you are aware, the world as we once knew it has gone and it is now a whole new world, courtesy of information technology people like you.

A few years ago, only birds could “tweet”; the only “facebook” you know was possibly your photo album; and “blogging” didn’t mean anything I can readily remember. But these are the things that have changed the way mankind receives information and are indeed gradually shaping the course of human history, as we saw in the “Arab Springs”.  The use and impact of the New Media in recent elections in the United States of America have been widely acknowledged.

Clearly, the New Media have not only become a part of our daily lives, but are indeed defining our lives, such that you can either love it, or hate it. But you definitely cannot ignore it.

In the past, to be a journalist, you had to go to a journalism school and be employed in a media company.  Becoming a publisher was even much more demanding, because of the capital outlay required. Today, we have what has been referred to as “citizen journalism”, where practically anybody that has a computer or smartphone is potentially a journalist, and indeed a publisher.

You are here today because you are very active players in this new world order. You are the people that largely determine and define trends and others follow. You are the ones carrying the banner of the New World and marching right in front, while the rest of mankind queues behind you. It is a very powerful platform that you possess and it is an important role that you have taken upon yourselves. Without any effort to sound patronizing, you are the new journalists and new media owners, as it were.

Just like all industries with low entry barriers, your industry has many practitioners. Some are in it for fun (otherwise called Passion) and others are there for business. And just like not all traditional media houses are profitable, some of you are not yet running as profitable businesses. Some of you are not maximizing your potentials and some of you do not realize what enormous powers you wield. Those who recognize such are either not exercising such powers or are exercising such without responsibility.

It is an attempt to highlight these issues just mentioned that Fidelity Bank decided to host this Nigerian Bloggers Fair 2013, the very first of its kind in Nigeria. It is our hope that these two days you have spent here have proved useful to you. The theme for the Fair this year is Blogging Profitably. We chose it  because every media operator must have an objective, the accomplishment of which is the Profit. And if it is not achieving that Profit either by way of financial returns or propagation of ideas, then it is indeed not Profitable.

One final word I will like to leave with you is to realize your powers and to exercise  them with responsibility. We are a growing nation. We have our challenges, no doubt. The duty of journalism, whether the traditional model or the new digital model should be to educate and to build. We should, as much as possible, avoid sensationalism and crosscheck facts before uploading, knowing the impact that wrong information could have. None of you wants an innocent man to be lynched on account of a story carried by you.

We also desire that you could organize and run with some structure and develop platforms for cross-fertilization of ideas. That way, you can encourage one another, protect one another and support the nation, even as a group. It is difficult, But it is doable

We do hope, this Fair has been a good use of your time and that there have been lessons learnt for life and vocation.

THE REMARK WAS BY THE MD & CEO, FIDELITY BANK PLC, MR. REGINALD IHEJIAHI, OFR, AT THE CLOSING CEREMONY OF THE FIRST EVER NIGERIAN BLOGGERS FAIR SPONSORED BY FIDELITY BANK FROM APRIL 26- 27, 2013.