Premium Times Centre for Investigative Journalism (PTCIJ)

The Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development [CJID], the parent organisation of Dubawa Ghana, has officially launched in Abuja, Nigeria.

The Centre will help the West African news media community fulfil “a mission to improve governance, promote a community of informed citizenry, and entrench democratic accountability,” CJID Chief Executive Officer, Dapo Olorunyomi said at the launch dinner on Tuesday the 8th of February 2022.

This mission, he added, has found expression in many innovative interventions, including Dubawa which is a transnational fact-checking product in Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

The CJID, formerly known as the Premium Times Centre for Investigative Journalism [PTCIJ], first announced its name change in a press release on the 17th of January 2022, where the organisation revealed its new identity and shared its expanded vision for the organisation over the next few years, after operating as PTCIJ for eight years.

“Back in 2014, when the PTCIJ was established, the key idea was to expand the practice of investigative reporting to an exponential level and give journalism a coherent inference as the epicentre of democracy-building in Nigeria,” Dr Tobi Oluwatola, the Acting Executive Director of the organisation, said at the dinner to reintroduce its new name and announce its expanded vision to key stakeholders, funders and partners at the Transcorp Hilton, in Abuja, the current.

“We are proud of the work we have done to expand the reach and depth of investigative journalism in Nigeria, but today, our work has expanded beyond investigative journalism to include media innovation and policy advocacy. Through our multiple projects in the development sector [agriculture, health, climate change, the extractive sector], cross-sectoral data analytics, and more, we have produced several knowledge products that have been used to expand the capacity of journalists to report on these developmental issues,” he added.

Explaining the organisation’s expansion into West Africa under its new name, the Manager overseeing this, Ms Caroline Anipah, said: “The CJID began its expansion into other English-speaking countries in West Africa in 2019. We started with Ghana, and now we are in Sierra Leone, The Gambia and Liberia. In all of these countries, we have been contributing to democratic governance and media development. We have been doing this through advocacy, capacity-building and research.”

According to her, through DUBAWA, Ghana is beginning to feel the impact of CJID’s media innovation by ruthlessly fighting the canker of fake news in the public domain, especially in traditional and social media.

The event was graced by dignitaries in the diplomatic community, including representatives from different embassies in Nigeria, key stakeholders in improving democratic processes and top editors from reputable newsrooms in Nigeria such as Mr Musikilu Mojeed from Premium Times, Mr Amzat Ajibola from the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR), Mr Ahmed Salkida from HumAngle and more. 

Some key stakeholders and partners of the organisation spoke of the organisation’s strides so far, reiterating their commitment to improving democratic processes and supporting sustainable journalism. Some of the speakers included Mr Jude Ilo from the OSIWA Foundation, Ms Tsema Ede from Heinrich-Böll Stiftung, Ms Toyin Akinniyi from Luminate, the representative of the Embassy of France in Nigeria, amongst others. 

“All of us coming out here is a testament to the fantastic work that [CJID] has recorded…I think any investment in [CJID] has been a fundamentally positive calculation,” said Jude Ilo. 

He concluded by saying: “When the story of the Nigerian media space is told, I am sure [CJID] will have the pride of place and perhaps in 50, 100 years to come, somebody will remember that an organisation took that noble decision to be for the people, to stand for the truth against all odds.”

All activities, projects and interventions implemented under PTCIJ remain valid under CJID and will be continued under the umbrella of The CJID.

Interested parties can learn more about The CJID on the organisation’s website: thecjid.org.

West Africa’s media innovation and development organisation, the Premium Times Centre for Investigative Journalism (PTCIJ), through its sub-regional fact-checking project, DUBAWA, today in Abuja, named its coveted fact-checking and research fellowship, the Kwame Karikari fact-checking and research fellowship, after Professor Kwame Karikari, former professor at the School of Communication Studies of the University of Ghana, Legon, former Dean of Communication Studies at Wisconsin University and founder of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA).

PTCIJ, in a statement Friday, April 23, by its Chief Executive Officer, Dapo Olorunyomi, said it decided to name the three-year-old fellowship after Professor Karikari in recognition of his “life work in the development of accountability journalism, his mentorship and training of generations of journalists in the sub-region and his redoubtable work in the advocacy for and promotion of media freedom in West Africa.”

Olorunyomi said the idea of the fellowship was “inspired by the need to tackle and curb the rapid spread of mis- and dis-information and further expand the art and reach of verified and accurate information to rural and urban societies, to institutionalise a culture of fact-checking across the sub-region, and to build knowledge around the menace of information disorder.” 

The Kwame Karikari fellowship will follow a twin-track, according to Olorunyomi, each of which offers either a six-months fellowship for intending fact-checkers seeking to incorporate enhanced verification measures into their work; and the six-month scholars fellowship for academics seeking a path to original research in knowledge production around information disorder. 

Moreover, Olorunyomi said, both tracks of the fellowship are designed to promote accountability of public institutions, institutionalise the art and culture of amplifying truth and stemming the phenomenon of programmed falsehood in newsrooms, while building competencies to strengthen democratic principles in the Anglophone axis of the West African sub-region.

The fact-checking track, according to Olorunyomi, is open only to journalists and reporters with at least a first degree who are currently working in traditional and new media from Ghana,  Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and The Gambia. For this category, he said, experience in fact-checking is not required of prospective applicants.

“All that is essential, is their interest in pursuing fact-checking of stories pertaining to politics, economy, health, governance, business, and media, as well as the willingness to think about ways to expand the reach of verified information to grassroots communities that are targeted constituencies for political, social, and cultural misinformation,” Olorunyomi said. 

The scholar track, he said, is an enhanced programme initiated through Dubawa’s Information Disorder Analysis Centre (IDAC), and is a project open only to postdoctoral and graduate/research fellows keen to create knowledge on the information disorder ecosystem through extensive research, following an identification of gaps in knowledge that should drive policy and democratic discourse around technological consequences, social media, and political legislation.

The Kwame Karikari fellowship is supported by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) in Washington DC, and the Heinrich Boll Stiftung Foundation (HBS). They both offer a monthly stipend to cover all costs of the investigation and research project for fellows.

The application call announced today will last until May 10, when a four-day selection process will begin. After a one- week training offered by a team of international scholars and experts, the fellowship will commence at the end of May and run through November.

Prospective applicants should apply here for researchers and PhD holders and here for journalists interested in fact-checking.