A paper presented by Olufemi Awoyemi Saturday in Lagos Nigeria.

Theme: Accessing the Archdiocesan Centre for Media Development

A Business Approach to Media Practice

October 08, 2011; 1020 hrs, Holy Family Catholic Church, Festac Town , Lagos , Nigeria

 Ladies and Gentlemen,

When I first got the call about an invitation to present a paper at this most auspicious occasion, I treated the matter with healthy suspicion because I have serious reservations about two things – the state of media practice in Nigeria and ‘media centre’ means in this context.

I was however persuaded to take up the challenge when I realised it offered me the opportunity to finally meet Peter Obiora’s Parish Priest, Rev. Fr. Anthony O. Obadina, cmf whom is held in high regard and to clarify my work pedigree as a ‘social entrepreneur’ and not a ‘highly experienced media entrepreneur’ as gracefully stated in his invitation letter to me.

A few caveats may therefore be necessary before I undertake my mission today – which from my understanding is to find a better way to bring out an entrepreneurial approach to the archdiocesan centre for media development it has recently created.

For the purposes of this address, I will choose to use the word CMD (centre for Media development) rather than the cliché – media centre – for it refers to two different things and therefore elicits two different strategic approach; though one may argue that the term media centre can be subsumed under the CMD definition.

Being the first speaker, I crave the indulgence of my co-speakers to stray a bit into using personal and poignant examples to review the objectives of the CMD as discerned from the yet to be operational website, look at the nexus between the media, business and the church and offer my thoughts on the approach open to the centre in my closing remarks.

The Youth and Role of Development Centres

By way of background, I started off as a Catholic and benefited from a quality kindergarten, primary and secondary school education the Catholic church offered in the 60s to the early 80’s. At various times, I attended an Anglican church for my boys brigade experience; a CAC church for Sunday and mid-week worships as my mother mandated; a Four Square Church during my Youth Service; a Redeemed Church for crusades and deliverance from economic and financial bondage holding the family down; and undertook occasional visits to the mosque on ceremonial days as part of my extended family obligations.

As a youth from an average (middle class) background whose parents progressed through life as measured by the movement from a room accommodation in Onipanu area to a flat in Ojota over a 20 year period; I had more incentives to fail than to succeed but for the Grace of God.

Indeed, during my time; and contrary to the “previous years were better cliché quoted by all”; the society, as shaped by the media was a constant cycle of negativity that it scared everyone into thinking of getting out of a crumbling kingdom. The only saving grace I had were perhaps related to my encounters with books such as My Early years by Obafemi Awolowo which I read at age 12 and which established in me that it was okay to carry firewood across villages in the morning before going back to school and coming back to help your parents with work when you finished. His life motivated me and challenged me to rise beyond the negativity.

I tried to get out so many times though, I tried to run away from it all for you may never really know the trauma a youth feels when he/she is constantly faced with negative media reports and he is left wondering what will happen to his dreams, his talents and his opportunities. It can be pretty dire and very few people are able to handle the pressure.

For some, the church offers a refuge. For others, they simply move to the other side or drop out of the whole race all together.

This is an inevitable reality we have been told. It is however one I refuse to accept because history has shown us that we can have a collective upliftment in society and today we live in extraordinary times where the media – using new tools and practices has pushed the barriers and shown the way.

We felt it last week when we lost Steve Jobs, we see it daily since February when the Arab spring started, we felt it during our 2011 elections here, we acknowledge it when we all watch the English premier league and care less about what happens locally except today when the Green Eagles make all of us expert football managers and we go on facebook and twitter to connect.

At Proshare, we feel it daily. We know it and continue to learn about the power of the media as a transformational tool that can help transiting economies achieve their development responsibilities and empower the people to get involved.

Media and Society

The news media can play a complex role at the best of times, and the worst of times – in times of peace by enabling citizens to be heard and to engage in debate as part of good governance, and during economic turmoil as we are experiencing, when the media sector becomes even more crucial.

And yet, the role of media in so-called developing societies like ours for example – with a growing youth population and a rising unemployment and access to resource gap – remains relatively under-examined, despite the fact that the country boasts of so many ‘publications’ from the old and new media.

Today, everybody is a publisher – it only requires for you to have a facebook account. Having a blog is bigger and actually having a website with newsletter capabilities even bigger. Yet, the total number of papers published in a day in Nigeria is less than a million copies; and the total number of websites far less than 500 for a country with a populations size of 150 million and a telephony density ratio that is the fastest growing in the emerging economy/market.

Consequently, there is a knowledge gap vis-à-vis the role played by media in the various strands of nation building such as ensuring that our children enjoy qualitative education, medical care, able to access mortgages for affordable housing, provided with an enabling environment that allows their talents to be developed for future entrepreneurship, governance and long-term development.

Add to this the exponential growth and impact of new media such as text messaging, Twitter, mobile telephony and others, an area that remains virtually unexplored.

It is thus clear to me that the exist a huge gap in the media-society relationship and this will remain so because of problems related to credibility of platforms, ethics, integrity of journalists and the absence of a period of knowledge acquisition and development.

Experience of the Church in this Area

This I believe is one of the issues being addressed by a Catholic Church inspired Lagos Business School ( PAU to be precise) through its centre for media programs.

It would appear then that the CMD initiative must be a different initiative or a similar kind targeted at the lower end of the market – perhaps to augment the perhaps ‘elitist’ programme by the PAU .

This perception has to be addressed for my expectations for the CMD varies from this; and perhaps they can be seen as two parts of one initiative.

When this is resolved, we can learn that humble beginnings also help to manage perception for when the Opus Dei started the LBS some 20 years ago with a seed capital of $10,000, it was understood that the true test of the service was its ability to self finance itself – if only to show that society itself seeks a higher ideal and where that to be the case, it would be sustainable as people seek to join the oasis being created of people empowered with the right values and ethics to take on the larger society. It was not just the quality education that it offered that attracted people or stood it out, it was the overall value system from its faculty down to the workers and the alumnus.

Seriously, the best lesson here is that a business approach starts with a review of the business sustainability question – is your proposition motivated by money? If yes, it will fail. If otherwise, I can proceed.

The Media, Business and the Catholic Church

According to the CMD website (http://catholiccmd.com/) the objectives for the Centre can be surmised as follows:

        Enhancing Media Culture

        Support of intellectual partnerships across media fields and media academic units towards new collaborative research and scholarships, teaching and outreach efforts with the focus on Christ as the centre point.

        To address issues of public concern regarding media performance and to bring critical issues to the public’s attention.

        An active concern for youth and media development.

I applaud the initiative and the objectives set out and have decidedly done what you asked me in putting together business approach to address.

It is my belief that this platform was meant to be a honest assessment of a phenomenon that transcends the local parish. It permeates our national life and once again, the church is seeking to do what it has done best all the years – be ahead of the curve in a more structured manner which its institutions allows it to play in our lives.

I should therefore like to get the big elephant in the room out of the way by addressing some salient points I consider key to appreciating the approach advanced.

First, let me comment on how business; the media and the church can co-exist under such an initiative. At the very base of this tripod is the imperative to forge new networks that will promote research on the role of media in transitional societies – from developing to emerging and developed nations.

When Steve Jobs created the I-Pod, a storage device that can hold up to a thousand songs, he knew it was not just the storage he was providing, it was neither the portability that it provided nor was it the transportability that it encouraged; but the fact that it was the precursor to an I-Tunes that will change the way artistes all over the world can release songs and break themselves from the shackles of the record companies. They fought back but could not beat the tide. It had long turned when the I-Pod gained ground.

It could be argued that we replaced one monopoly with another – yet such transformational ideas that changed the definition of a media centre from a single platform to a multi-platform capability is why this CMD initiative must be properly understood to offer a real chance to the society.

To those who would look at the centre therefore as a new layer in the molecular activity designed to re-order society have to contend with the perception about the platform owner – the church – which ironically forms a premise for evaluating such an initiative in the first place.

In short, no matter how lofty the ideals are and how sincere the protagonist push the idea – the public is unable to separate itself from the oxymoron that business objectives, a media centre and the church ownership represents.

Thus, the question ought to be asked – are these things mutually exclusive? Have these three subjects not been harnessed to the benefit of society and commerce in time past? Has the church not led the way in media practice and business at its early beginnings? Has the Catholic Church not been a beacon of how to run a sustainable enterprise and was it not the first ever global franchise before anyone even coined the word – franchise?

The media – church relationship is therefore not new and we should not agonise over that. What is new however is the nexus between the traditional perspective of the church and the new age expectations and power of the media and its practice – Both combined in an entity is sure to warrant concerns.

Second, the Vatican has been reported to have interests in business mostly dealing with restoration of art works and selling of reproductions of works in their collection. Also it has some commercial holdings in banking, real estate and wine making and of course religious publication and media.

So why should it now want to get involved in a CMD type initiative?

Well, we can look to the reason provided in the DECREE ON THE MEDIA OF SOCIAL COMMUNICATIONS, INTER MIRIFICA, SOLEMNLY PROMULGATED BY HIS HOLINESS POPE PAUL VI ON DECEMBER 4, 1963 – where the Vatican affirmed that (introduction) –

1. Among the wonderful technological discoveries which men of talent, especially in the present era, have made with God’s help, the Church welcomes and promotes with special interest those which have a most direct relation to men’s minds and which have uncovered new avenues of communicating most readily news, views and teachings of every sort. The most important of these inventions are those media which, such as the press, movies, radio, television and the like, can, of their very nature, reach and influence, not only individuals, but the very masses and the whole of human society, and thus can rightly be called the media of social communication.

If there was any doubt about the motive for the CMD, we find concrete support in point 2 where it states that:

2. The Church recognizes that these media, if properly utilized, can be of great service to mankind, since they greatly contribute to men’s entertainment and instruction as well as to the spread and support of the Kingdom of God . The Church recognizes, too, that men can employ these media contrary to the plan of the Creator and to their own loss. Indeed, the Church experiences maternal grief at the harm all too often done to society by their evil use. Hence, this sacred Synod, attentive to the watchful concern manifested by the Supreme Pontiffs and Bishops in a matter of such great importance, judges it to be its duty to treat of the principal questions linked with the media of social communication. It trusts, moreover, that the teaching and regulations it thus sets forth will serve to promote, not only the eternal welfare of Christians, but also the progress of all mankind. Further reading can be gleaned here –

http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19631204_inter-mirifica_en.html

In June 2011, 38 years after – Pope Benedict acknowledged the profound effects of social media in his 45th World Day of Social Communications address which was followed up with the launch of a new website on June 29 by the Holy See. The news portal – www.news.va – aggregates the main news from the Vatican ’s other communication channels, up to three times a day. It also has a link for social media including Twitter feeds and Facebook links.

This is all part of the Vatican’s realisation that it can reach a new audience by connecting and interacting with the outside world, instead of simply preaching from a distance.

The matter is thus resolved – the church, media and business can co-exist; and these linkages are not limited to religion.

It therefore offers room for the church to engage in activities that improves the lives of its “parish” without sacrificing the doctrines. In effect, it demands that we should not approach the Church with a business-school mindset which ignores that the priesthood is a calling and not a career.

The business outlook for the church’s media centre must therefore be defined in these terms.

The Essentials of Today’s Media Platforms and the Approach needed

To run a CMD therefore, in the least, the more essential things it must consider for a business mindset must be a strategic framework that has a ‘start at the beginning and not in the middle, walk before you run’ approach.

It cannot be a “dip-your-toe-in-the-water” approach — from my experience that does not work in the new society. A business approach that has new media success as its objective requires a sustained commitment over time. But this strategic approach is, to stay with that metaphor, an approach to determining the depth of the lake, the temperature of the water, and the kind of fish you’ll be swimming with before you jump in.

In short, the end game must be clear before the game starts – you must want to win and be the platform of choice in a sea of so many alternatives – then you have to differentiate yourselves clearly!

So how do you differentiate? I may not have all the right answers but I can share my experience and thoughts on this:

Proshare’s Experience

I early referred to myself as a social entrepreneur – well that is because the company was set up from a social need resolution mindset – to address some social issues related to the financial services sector; which continues to evolve as society’s realities change.

How is it a business when we do not charge for usage? We use our competence and collective network to earn professional services fee from discerning individuals and firms who pay for thought-led engagements and others who consider the platform a veritable platform to advertise given our ability to represent a critical bridge in the information flow for the market.

In 2006, we started the service as a TV public enlightenment service for the Diaspora who wanted to invest back home in Nigeria . Soon we recognised that the banking consolidation would create a huge interest in the capital market but was alarmed at the high level of factually inaccurate information being pushed out with obvious regulatory inertia that was bound to create a crisis, slow down the development of the capital market, reverse the participation of retail investors, make nonsense of the flow of investments being made by the hardworking Nigerians sending money home and we decided to act.

The choice of a website was as a result of the different locations that contributors lived in then. I was in the UK , Biosah was in the USA , Bayo was in Canada and the leg work was in Nigeria . It was a pretty obvious choice.

We did not have to run any advert promoting the site nor did we have to run around to seek endorsements or partnerships as we made a conscious decision to focus on resolving complaints and build the business from references. This was the test of market relevance for us and one I took knowing fully well the possibility of failure but I had faith in the gap identified.

As Peter Obiora, a member of the parish and our former News Editor can attest to, it was a constant battle to convince staff and the public on why the focus on resolving these issues remained a key component of the service culture in-house; especially when money was not coming in. I expected that and never used it as an excuse for paying staff poorly or missing salary dues. We never defaulted on our obligations.

We became a business in 2009 when the market understood we had become a veritable bridge between the investors and the quoted companies at one point of a square, the regulators at another, the operators at another and the media at the fourth. Companies engaged us for specialised services related to the value chain in the capital market business and most importantly relied on us for credible, reliable, and actionable market intelligence and data.

We progressively moved on to address the data problems in the market with various upgrades culminating in the current one – a 21 month project and have moved to address various issues affecting that foundational belief – to be the media of choice for the financial markets.

Recognising our social responsibility objective remain key to us.

We have actively engaged on issues such as the impeding market crash (for which we issued a well published report like I have here and never charged for same); challenged decision from Advertisers and clients like the waivers on Dangote cement, The plight of investors over private placements, the share service gaps in allocation, dividends and handling outright stealing by licensed operators; Ndi Okereke’s technical suspension of Transcorp Shares to shield it from a run, NSE and SEC’s policies and lack of enforcement on compliance related issues; The precedent setting removal of the NSE DG and the cycle of negativity it creates, Femi Otedola’s N170bn debt to the market that led to the invasion of our offices and my public slander; Recapitalisation issues in the banking sector and only this morning issued a release on the misrepresentation in the media about what a bear market means and the false headlines describing market drops.

This is the value a Centre for Media Development can give to society.

Next Steps

My take is that you should immediately define and make clear what it is you want to achieve with the CMD and push out products, people, activities and consumers that align with how you would like to be seen. Period!

The central challenge is to stop playing with the idea and start using it to build capacity.

I am not advocating that the Catholic Church becomes a commercial operation. I simply want it to acknowledge the for most of its parishes whose revenues are inching up while expenses are rising faster because of aging facilities, mounting labour costs, and continued pressure from the members for help from the church to deal with overbearing economic realities.

If ever there was a compelling need to engage society, this is the time.

What can the CMD do?

When it comes to media in Africa , radio remains the dominant mass medium but other information and communications technologies are growing exponentially and complementing traditional radio. In Nigeria , the next big thing must be the ‘handhelds’.

The focus of the Centre for Media Development in Nigeria can be broadly stated to include the following:

1.     Support Nigerian researchers and research organizations to produce rigorous and analytical social science research findings on how the purposes and functions of traditional media means are influenced/changing by new ICTs. This it can do with collaboration with International Development Agencies, Universities, and Firms set up to help developing countries use science and technology to find practical, long-term solutions to the social, economic, and environmental problems they face. They equally provide funding and this can be complemented by support from telecoms companies in Nigeria, the NCC and the Federal or State Governments who increasingly understand that Governance has a lot to do with communications through the media.

2.     Publish findings into topical issues of the day by harnessing the huge human capital available to the Church on various social, economic, political and policy issues that help the public understand better the issues and provide the traditional news mediums credible data required to engage meaningfully.

3.     Seek to establish relevant indicators and proxies for development in Nigeria by fostering a network of experts and researchers in any given field – through its website – to not only disseminate their research findings, but to promote further research in this area.

4.     Structure out an internship program which allows journalists and senior journalism students from other countries to spend time in Nigeria, working as interns with media organizations to help these media outlets fill some gaps in their reporting staff and to create a corps of future reporters in Developed countries who will have first-hand experience in reporting and living in the developing world, thus broadening their future coverage. This internship program can be made possible through private donations from former publishers and concerned Nigerians matching funds from the Centres pool of donations and sponsorships.

5.     Tap into the social media revolution by creating a CMA News Service, a pan-African network of independent journalists producing stories of local and international interest for a worldwide audience. For example, you can take the subject of opportunities in agriculture on the continent and everyone from everywhere will be encouraged to focus on the positives which could attract others to them. The can share experiences on what their challenges are and learn from each other. A summary of key discussion points can be issued monthly which is packaged as an e-publication and sponsorship sought for this all year round.

6.     Develop an Online Tool Set for Social Issues. For example we can do the quick wins such as a Driving Test Portal in collaboration with the FRSC which would have a copy of the Highway code in it, locations of where physical driving test can be conducted, the process of obtaining a driving licence and a sample driving test people can take as often as they wish after paying a token for it and the result considered. Sponsorship for this can be sourced from the Car Manufacturers and Dealers who can also provide barter deals for competitions and programs that reward deserving publics and officials involved in road management issues.

7.     Provide Tools and Guides that allow the Youth be all that they can – Directory of sports academies, recording studios, academic grants and schorlaships, NGO support, Youth Organising, Democratic grassroots movement, social media sites, online radio, webTV and Blogs.

8.     Librarianship – Hybrid library area storing audio or visual material rather than books and research work from individuals and institutions who provide rights for this as well as the work from the centre.

9.     Teach beginner and advanced classes in everything from TV broadcast to photography to media ethics.

10.            Linkages to sites – of selected partners and value adding institutions which reflect those the centre is following on twitter for example.

Closing Thoughts – A battle never won

Since the Enlightenment age, we are at a time when it’s possible to imagine societies – towns, cities, and even countries – without any agreed or verifiable forms of the truth. Religion has always filled the void but with increasing lack of access to the resources that can create a meaningful life to members; the church must fully embrace the need to not only be a place for doctrine/worship – but must move along the lines of the South American Priests who recognised the need for the church to fill the void created by society – not alter it openly but influence it directly.

This was what the Nigerian church did in the 50’s through the 80’s. I could almost recall reading Cardinal Olubunmi Okogie on a weekly basis, using the media to advance the cause of social change. Rev. Fr Matthew Kukah continues to do the same – from conflict mediation to commentaries and insights on nation building and personal responsibility. There are many more for whom we know less about who would benefit from such a focussed centre.

This is more like going back to the basics for the Catholic Church – yet, this time – it has to deal with a more enlightened citizenry, more sceptical of motives, quite conscious of the limitations of the church and most certainly well aware of the financial benefits involved.

In the final analysis, what you seek to do here is more about an enlightened self interest and a maximisation of group power than an opportunistic voyage. We should not be so intimidated by the sheer responsibility it connotes to abandon the call.

What we can therefore agree on at this seminar is that there is a quieter, less glamorous side to this initiative which is also vital, and which is not easily replicated by other platforms or religious organisation – but by you, given its unique history.

This is the simple craft of providing a centre that allows people to bridge the divide between the poor education services available now (for which no one institution has been able to provide a skill set relevant for today’s times through the curriculum when it is not out of reach for the average joe), the limited access to up-market technology and the platform that has the clout to push the end product into the mainstream or force the mainstream to accept its own version.

The battle lines are drawn and this time, it is not only a moral battle but one of wisdom – knowing how to look beyond what comes to the church to seeing what the church can produce using legitimate means to convince the business sector and the media on how this ensures its own survival.

It is doable and practical.

Finally, what is before us today is a generational responsibility you choose of your own free will, dragged me into and now have to make a success of. I am convinced that there is no need to feel unduly pressured, for the market realities indicate to me that with the right communications management, this is more than achievable.

I acknowledge that my contributions could have been more detailed but I have tried to do the right thing – allow the audience to draw their own conclusions and see the possibilities this initiative can deliver.

Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for listening.

Olufemi AWOYEMI, FCA, AIoD, ACIT

Founder/CEO Proshare Nigeria Limited

www.proshareng.com

ceo@proshareng.com

Tel: 00234 803 628 8637