In the beginning…
“But why journalism? Must you be
a journalist?”
That was the painful question my
mother asked me for the umpteenth time in 1998, as she lent me yet another
round of money which I swore I would
refund just like the past 6 loans. I understood her pain. It is a
question that is as old as the hills for many of us who chose to be journalists
at a time when careers in Merchant banks and oil companies were the in thing. I have unfortunately had to explain again and
again to genuinely concerned friends and family.
I remember my sister asking me
out of sheer concern. “What is it about this journalism? You barely make enough
to eat.”
Strangely I have never had to
search for an answer. My reply has always been ‘why not journalism?’ I remember
asking a friend if he would rather have me become a carpenter or an Engineer.
I cant help it. I have always
been a newsman .Always will be ,I think. Whether it was in primary school when
I read newspapers to myself in front of a mirror or in boarding school when I became the unofficial love
–letter writer for my classmates. Or when my friends and I launched the
University of Jos first and only newspaper to date in 1992. By the way, it was that
same year that after much lobbying and harassment on my part, the Plateau Radio
Television Corporation gave in to my demands to produce and present a program on
its new FM Station.
What many people will never
understand about this profession is that it is abstract. You cant feel, touch
or see the benefits. But there is an adrenaline rush that is only gotten when a
story you do kicks up a storm and gets policy makers who generally think in
election cycles, to factor the interests of the wider society into their plans.
However, in a society that
largely grants the validity of mostly boisterous values, when you tell people
you are a journalist, the look on their faces changes from admiration to one of
pity and concern. People think,’ how do you survive?’ I recall trying to
convince a certain lady who spent the better part of an hour trying to advise
me to consider other careers options, that I really loved what I did.
However, its 2014 and my friends
and family are tired. It looks to them like I am in this thing for the long
haul.
Besides times have changed. I now
realize that when you contribute economically to your family’s affairs nobody
really gives a hoot how you make the money.
Happy New Year!!!!!!!!!!
Chima Nwankwo is a Freelance Broadcast
Journalist and
member of the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations based in Abuja ,Nigeria. He has reported for
Reuters, China Central TV and A24 Media. While he believes that the
constitutional role of the media is to hold government accountable, he believes
that the journalist performs this task with more ease when his bills are paid.
M: +234 806 668 6769
T:Chimsky1
