CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1 This policy document started its life with a seminar on National Communication Policy organized by the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture in collaboration with a highly dedicated interdisciplinary group of university lecturers and researchers, appointed by the Ministry of Information and Culture, and assisted by the Nigerian Institute of Journalism (NIJ) and some eminent mass communicators in Nigeria
1.2 The seminar which was held at the Administrative Staff College of Nigeria (ASCON), Badagry, from Monday, 2nd February to Saturday, 7th February 1987 was declared open by the Chief of Army Staff, Major-General Sani Abacha, on behalf of the President, Commander-in Chief of the Armed Forces. The one-week seminar was attended by over 250 participants drawn from all fields of mass communication and related disciplines. Former Minister of Information and veteran mass communications also participated in the seminar
1.3 The seminar sat in 12 sessions during which 52 commissioned papers were read. In addition to these papers were 24 other papers received at the panel of Experts Committee level. Each of the sessions had a panel of experts whose function was to synthesise all the views and ideas in the papers delivered and in the contributions from discussions on its assigned areas of policy and make recommendations. The commitment and zeal of members of these panels resulted in the recommendations which made up the Report at the seminar 1.4 The draft reports submitted by the panel of Experts and the papers presented during the seminar at both the plenary session and committee level were further examined and synthesized by a coordinating panel of Experts that worked relentlessly for five days at Durbar Hotel, Lagos, a week after the ASCON Seminar
1.5 The final report of members of this Co-ordinating Panel was then edited and put together in a logical whole by a few members of the Panel and the document became the “Report of the National Communication Policy Seminar”
1.6 This report was tabled before and considered by the Conference of the National Council on Information Culture held in Zaranda Hotel, Bauchi, from 17th to 20th March, 1987
1.7 The report of the National Communication Policy Seminar and an extract of the minute of the Bauchi Conference of the National Council on Information and Culture on the subject were again “milled” and “processed” by another 12-man committee empanelled by the Ministry of Information and Culture to produce this policy document This policy package therefore represents a most painstaking and careful distillation of ideas from an immense volume of contributions by intellectuals, professionals, practitioners and administrators in all core, related and supportive fields of mass communication. Even more. It has been adopted with amendments (which are all reflected in the document) by the National Council, Of Ministers (January 20-21, 1988), the National Council of States (March 17, 1990) and the Armed Forces Ruling Council (April 10, 1990).
1.8 It is the fervent hope of all those who pooled their mental and physical energies to produce this policy package that its implementation will go a long way to ensure the better management of our communication resources to facilitate development and nation building.
CHAPTER 11: THE PHILOSOPHY AND OBJECTIVE OF NATIONAL COMMUNICATION POLICY
Philosophy
2.1 Philosophy or ideology is generally a coherent set of fundamental principles enunciated to underpin a people’s way of life and aspirations. Those principles are, by and large, structured statements of goals, objectives, hopes and aspirations. The purpose of philosophy or ideology is not only to ensure uniform control over most processes of interactions among citizens of a state but also to orient thought and action in a unidirectional path towards stated national goals.
2.2 The “philosophy” of a national communication policy must therefore be founded on a national ideology or philosophy where it exists. Strong cases were made at the ASCON Seminar by scholars and mass communicators of various schools of thought that a national ideology should precede the formulation of a national communication policy. There were ideological advocates of the right and left and what a Speaker termed “Middleroadism”. The consensus of the opinion, however, was that, although Nigeria did not have an ideological blueprint couched in one of the capitalism/socialism/welfarism categories, it does have structured statement of goals, objectives, hopes and aspirations enshrined in chapter 11 of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1979 as the fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy which provide enough foundation upon which the National communication policy can be built. Objectives
2.3 The objectives of the national communication policy are:
(1) To identify critical or central organs, mechanism or institutions of our society that are involved in the development of Nigeria’s communications system, both internally and externally.
(2) To provide guidelines for the mobilizations and development of those institutionalized mechanisms in (i) above to achieve national objectives and aspirations.
(3) To mobilize all structures in society in a chain system relationship for the propagation of national goals and objectives
(4) To evolve a rational and systemic parking of all communication media and resources for the achievement of national goals
(5) To establish operational boundary for the media industry
(6) To promote and consolidate the national interest
(7) To ensure better management of communication resources to facilitate development and nation building
(8) To harness our immeasurable cultural wealth to develop an authentic Nigerian culture, to cultivate a deep sense of patriotism in our people and to propagate world-wide distinctive national identity
(9) To further, at home and abroad those cardinal principles upon which our nation and constitutions are founded and which protect and enhance Nigeria’s national interests and security in the international system
(10) To encourage creativity and promote indigenously rooted innovation for the collective good rather than for individual self-expression. |
