The essence of the agenda setting function of the Media is to proffer solutions to societal problems, a university don, Professor Godwin Okon has said, warning that the Media should be wary of docility and complacency.

Prof. Okon, who is a Professor of Development Communication and Advocacy at the Rivers State University (RSU), Port Harcourt, said this on Wednesday, July 26, 2023 while delivering the keynote lecture during a One-Day Workshop by De Gratia Centre for Media Rights and Education in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.

Harping on the event theme: Post 2023 Media Agenda Roadmap: Conceptualization and Opinionization, the erudite Professor posited that the Media cannot be detached from existence and that in order to strike a balance in its reportage, there was the existential need for constructivism.

He remarked that news stories that proffer solution are far-reaching than audience satisfaction, stressing that this brings the agenda setting function of the Media to the fore, thus making the story more active, adding that this can only happen when journalists learn to think outside the box.

Speaking, the Executive Director of De Gratia Centre for Media Rights and Education, Paulinus Nsirim, stressed that recent developments have played up the need for media practitioners to exit that unprofessional and unethical paradigm, pointing out that staying too long there has rendered practitioners a laughing stock in the society with the public viewing them as tools in the hands of the highest bidder.

He stressed that there is need for self-cleansing by the Media with a view to maintaining the ethics of the profession and making truth, objectivity and fairness its watchword.

“This should not be so. Media regulatory bodies should ensure that standard qualifications and professional competences form the yardstick for recruitment in organisations in our country because this all-comers game is belittling our noble profession.”

Other keynote speakers who spoke at the workshop are former Rivers State Commissioner for Information, Ibim Seminitari, Professor of Development Communication and Media Studies at the University of Port Harcourt, Choba, Professor Walter Ihejirika, and Dr. Sunny Mbaize.

The event hosted some reputable journalists, broadcasters, presenters, interns and students of various institution.