The Dean, School of Communications, Lagos State University (LASU), Professor Lai Oso, who once chaired the panel of Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Reporting, explains the roles of the media as regards the coming 2015 general elections,in this interview with SULAIMON MOJEED-SANNI of BlackBox Nigeria excerpts;

What is your take on the argument of whether the standard of education as improved or dropped in Nigeria?

I would say that one cannot give an absolute answer, in some instances; there have been a lot of improvement. For instance, when I was growing up, even in the university, there was nothing like this internet  facilities, we don’t really know anything about computer, we all depend on the books that are available in the library or the once we can buy. Now students of nowadays have better access, at least, 95 per cent even in Secondary school have an idea of the internet and social media. And there are some good ones amongst them that if you are going to your class to teach and you are not well prepared, you would be in trouble because they have access, to so many materials. At that end, we have some very good students, who are well prepared, self-motivated, and good. At the other extreme end, are the very lazy, very poor, not ready to read students, and that is the ones that people see to say the standard of education is falling. Nobody is seeing the high flyers that are doing well, and that I think is in human nature, we always say oh, our students are not prepared and are unemployable. When I finished as a graduate, I started my journalism career with News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, immediately we were employed, we proceeded for three weeks orientation, they brought all of us employed at that time together and take us through some of the things we have learnt in class and some we were never taught for us to fit into the work environment. But you can’t expect taking a graduate that just finished today, and put him in the office and tell him to start work. There must be some orientation; there must be socialization and acclimatization. So I am not really too comfortable when people just say the standard of education has fallen, yes, we find a good number students who should not be in the university. They should have at Junior Secondary School, gone into something else given basic literacy, numeracy that can make them to function and probably learn a trade. Then of course we must not forget the Nigerian environment, some of these children we are not good, but when they go abroad, they do very well. The environment must be factored in, we can’t just be condemning, without looking at the contest within which children read these days, within which lecturers teach and all of us we studied, we have a system where we do not have electricity, no latest books or journals, if not for internet, many of us might not have the opportunity to publish in any journal outside this country because we would not be aware of latest development, but thanks to the internet and e-libraries, that we have access to some current ideas. So, we must look at that contest, the Nigeria environment does not motivate the students to work, many of them would as me, after all the troubles, you get out there and there is no job. Why are you bothering yourself? Those are the things one should factor in before talking about the state of our education.

Can one say the government has failed in its responsibility to adequately cater for the education sector?

I think it has been established that there is poor funding of education. If you look at the environment, it is not conducive. If we need to compare ourselves with foreign universities, foreign students, then we must also provide the facilities; the environment must be comparable to those other foreign institutions that we are comparing with.

Having come from a Polytechnic background in your academic ascension, what is your take on the dichotomy/disparity between University B.sc and Polytechnic HND graduate?

It is a Nigeria factor; it was not like that when I joined the polytechnic. When I joined the polytechnic, Moshood Abiola Polytechnic then Ogun State Polytechnic, we had lecturers who came from the universities to join the polytechnics; everything was more or less at par. There was no discrimination; this dichotomy was not there, the thing gradually started when in the civil service if you are HND you cannot go beyond certain scale, if you are Bsc. You can become permanent secretary. As a lecturer your salary is this, it was not like that from the beginning. So, it is something that developed and it is not helping the country at all.

What do you think is the solution to this dichotomy?

Well, I think the main problem is in the civil service, I think the solution is that they should try to restructure the career progression in the civil service. Look at what people can do, you find out that in the private sector, for instance, they have put in some measures, if you have an HND in Accountancy and somebody has a BSc in Accountancy, the ultimate decider for the two of them would be their professional qualification. In Journalism, the ultimate decider is your productivity. If you have HND and you are very productive, you are bringing in good stories, doing good features and investigation, nobody looks at your degree again, you can become the editor. It is in the civil service that we have this problem and I think in the professions, they are trying to bridge the gap with professional qualification.

Would you say the advent of technology as had positive or negative impact on students’ performance?

It has had both negative and positive. Positive in the sense that the adventurous students, who are eager to learn now, have opportunity to expose themselves through access to materials on the internet. The negative side is the students who now go to the internet to plagiarize. You give them assignment, they just download an article put their names to it and submit. That is a very negative thing.

How has the LASU radio impacted on the hand-on experience of marrying town and gown in the communication world?

We have not really started real broadcasting, the equipment have just been installed. The radio station is yet to be commissioned, but the thing is that when it starts, the students would have a real life opportunity to have their hands on radio broadcasting because they can now go on air. What they do now is that they produce these programmes and play it in their practical studios while the lecturers listen. But now they can do programmes that would go on air and see the effect. And of course, the radio n can become an instructional material. For instance, when LASU begins a distant learning programme, the radio station can be used, even by the Lagos State government can use it as a tool for public enlightenment and awareness of social issues, social problems, so in that wise, it is a good thing for us to have the radio. It would be driven more by social service orientation.

OOU recently engaged Juju music maestro, Evangelist  Ebenezer Obey to teach and impact practical knowledge of music to students in the University, why hasn’t LASU lash-on her comparative advantage to have professionals in the communication industry on her list of lecturers?

I would not say we are not taking advantage of the opportunity we have, if you look at the Ebenezer Obey thing, it is likely the first in this country that we having such appoint and I would not be surprised if it will come. It is a development I am particularly happy about. We can bring in people who have achieved something in their profession, they are not academics, but they are on board to just share their experience with students and faculty members. I think it is a positive development and would not be surprised if other universities follow suit.

To what extent do you think the practice of corporate governance can enhance the growth of Nigeria?

It is an established fact now that corporate governance must be entrenched in our system of doing things. Already I know that in the private sector, banks for instance, Central Bank is insisting on corporate governance, it is part of ethics, accountability and transparency. So, it would permeate the entire system as we go along. Thing must be done according to certain laydown rules, people must know where they belong and all of us must be able to behave according to rules. You see, the era of one man dictating everything is gradually fading off, I think that is part of the overall democratization of our politics and society. As we imbibe democratic culture, it would definitely permeate all aspects of our lives. So it is something that should be welcome.

In recent years, journalists are becoming reluctant to verify facts or get engaged in investigative journalism, what do you see as a reason for this?

It is not that it is difficult to confirm facts; I think the main problem is one, are the resources available, that is, the media organizations, are they making the resources available to their journalists to do investigative journalism. Two, the journalists themselves, do they have the capacity, the skills to do investigative journalism, because investigative journalism is the top end of journalism practice. It is not just for everybody, you must have the skills to do it, to look through documents, do the leg work of interviewing so many people, and that is where resources must also come in. how many of Nigeria media organization can let a journalist loose for three months, doing an investigation on just one issue. It is something that is demanding and challenging, but based on my experience chairing the Wole Soyinka Award ceremony, you can see that there are some very good works going on among Nigerian journalist. You would be amazed at the kind of things they are bringing up in their reports. I think we are getting somewhere along that line.

The advent of social media and citizen journalism seems to be a threat to conventional journalism, do you for see an eventual overrun?

No, what I foresee are a kind of complimentary situation, social media and citizen journalism complimenting the conventional media, you don’t forget that that some of these traditional media organizations are now running their own e-copies of their editions that people can now access. Whenever any new medium comes up, there is always this fear it would kill the older ones, but that has never happened. When radio came people thought that it would kill the newspapers, but newspaper is till on and radio and television running, it would not necessarily kill it but compliment, no doubt, it would have some impact, some may migrate to the social media platform, but from studies, you found out that the older generation are more comfortable with their copies. They are more comfortable sitting down in front of their televisions to watch the news. And that is likely to be the trend.

The mortality rate in the print media has continued to be on the increase with mist papers not living to see their tenth year. As a scholar in this field what do you see as solution to this?

It is a Nigeria problem, you find out in some parts of the world like India, circulation is rising. In the Scandinavian countries, circulation is rising. But in Nigeria, we have a problem and it has been on for long even before the social media came, the Nigeria newspaper companies have been facing a lot of challenges mostly economic. Nigeria presents the world with an economic paradox, “a very rich country in terms of resources, but a very poor country in terms of the wellbeing of its citizens.” People, who don’t have money to feed themselves and do the essentials, can hardly have money to buy newspapers.

Protecting public interest and ownership interest is one of the challenges editors are often faced with. How do you think editors can make a distinction without losing their jobs?

That is a very difficult question; editors are walking a tight rope to quote the title of Dr. Babatunde Ajose’s memoir. They are walking a tight rope between so many forces not just proprietors and national interest. They are also walking a tight rope between advertisers and national interest. It is a very difficult situation, they face a dilemma every day in terms decisions they take, but the main problem as I always say is because we don’t have agreement on what is our national interest. If we have an agreement on what is our national interest, if there is kind of elite consensus on what is our national interest, editors would not have problem, owners would not have problem because by and larger, the owners interest would also go in line with the national interest and that in a way reduces the problem of the Editor. But in a situation where we have so many divergent interest, ethnic, religious, there is no way Editors would not have problems in negotiating between all this conflicting interests. At the end of the day, we must always have in mind, that if we don’t have a country, we cannot practice journalism, you need a country to practice journalism that means; at every time, Editors should be guided by that imperative that Nigeria must exist. People must live in peace, if there is crisis, the journalist, the citizen, the owner, and everybody would share in the crisis. That is a fundamental fact that should always guide us and of course, we must also think of the larger interest of the profession itself. If you put journalism as a profession in jeopardy by some unethical actions, then every one of us would also bear the brunt.  Again, most newspaper proprietors are capitalist, they want to sell their newspapers, so if any newspaper becomes unduly partisan, unduly unethical eventually, it would die off and the proprietor would have nothing to lay claim to.

Despite the passage of the FOI Bill, the access to information remains a herculean task, thus hampering the practice of journalism. How do you think we can wriggle out of this quagmire?

The problem is that journalist and Nigerians in general are not exploiting the opportunities provided in the act. We still fall shy of using the act as a weapon to open the secret cupboards and drawers of our government and so on. We are not challenging enough, we are not fighting enough and that is the problem. The act is just like any instrument, you have it, if you don’t use it, you won’t know how effective it is.

As we approach the 2015 elections, what role do you think the Fourth Estate of the Realm would play in ensuring Nigeria delivers free and fair elections?

The first one from a liberal democratic perspective is that the mass media should provide a platform for all competing voices to get to the electorates, that is, there must be plurality of views in the media. No group should be shut out of the media. Two, the media must be a platform for informing and educating Nigerians on the key issues that confront the nation today not just the in-fighting between the parties. Not just accusations and counter accusations, let us know what the keys issues are, this in a way would inform the electorate in forming their choices. Those are the key fundamentals I see as the role of the media.

What is your view of the country’s leadership so far?

Well, a country gets the kind of leadership it deserves, but I think the leadership we have don’t really know where we are going. There is a lot of confusion and that goes back to what I have said, without forging basic consensus on fundamental issues, we would continue to live in this confusion. People would continue to exploit the fault lines in Nigeria; Religious, ethnic and so on for personal and group advantages.

L-R: Managing Editor, News Agency of Nigeria, Abuja, Mr. Alli Hakeem; Mr. Tola Adeniyi and Dean, Lagos State University Adebola Adegunwa School of Communication, Prof. Lai Oso.

What is the way out of terrorism in the country particularly the issue of the Chibok school girls?

We are seeing different signals from the federal government, but let us face it, the key to the issue of the Chibok girls or Boko Haram insurgency is with the federal government. The government must make up its mind on what it wants to do. Telling us today, we are ready to negotiate, and then tomorrow somebody comes to say, we are not negotiating but we are on top of the situation, is making Nigerians confused. The government must make its position clear and pursue it with all the resources at its disposal but we are not getting that, which is the tragedy of the current situation we are in now.

There are speculations that the country might break up come 2015, what is your take on this?

Well, I don’t pray that Nigeria breaks up, from my experience, if you go outside this country, what gives you that respect apart from your own personal achievement or papers delivered, is the fact that you are a Nigerian. Many people from Africa, from Asia, when they hear Nigeria, there is a kind of envy. The look at you with some kind of mixed feelings, some respect then with mixed feelings like with all what this people have they cannot get themselves together, that is a disappointment, but that respect comes because of our size, our population, and our resources. Once we break up and we have tinny countries, in how many pieces would we break the country? When you hear about the southwest for instance, it is when we face a common enemy that we come together but when it is broken up, the Ibadan man would say he is not going with the Ijebu man, Ekiti would say it won’t go with Ijesha, and you would find that all over the places. In the South-south, will the Ijaws go with the Ibibio or Benin; would the middle belt be part of the north or want their own country? There are people who have come from one geo-political zone and are settled in another for ages, their children do not know anywhere, where do they go to? There have been a lot of interactions, connections that it would be a disaster for Nigeria to break up. Therefore, we must do everything to live peacefully as one country, united towards a common destiny.

Do you have any regrets?

I think something you would want to think things would be better for the country. When I was an under graduate the kind of opportunities we have and when I look at some of my students now, I see that they do not have same. I enjoyed a federal scholarship for my Ph. D, many of them may not have that same opportunity yet they are brilliant, those kinds of things give me a lot of concern. Thank God the LASU school fees has been reduced, you would see brilliant students who cannot cope. When I was an undergraduate, how much are we paying? If I was to pay the kind of fees they are asking students to pay now, maybe somebody like me would not have seen the four walls of a university. Those are the kind of things you think of and would want to say God need to help us. But overall, we must till thank God that we are alive.