April 18, 2016 By Victoria Saffa & Hawa Amara
Over 50 female journalists have been trained on news writing and reporting, media law and ethics and dress code.
The training was organised last Friday by Women in the Media Sierra Leone (WIMSAL) at the conference hall of Sierra Leone Association of Journalists (SLAJ) in Freetown.
President of WIMSAL, Ms Tiana Alpha, said the training was geared towards enhancing the capacity of female journalists in reporting, media law and ethics and dress code during work hours, adding that the training would help increase their efficiency in their respective media organisations.
Ms Alpha explained that WIMSAL’s core mandate was to strengthen the capacity of members to properly handle issues that affect women and girls in the country, and that one way to achieve that was to adequately report on such issues.
In his presentation, lecturer in the Department of Mass Communications at Fourah Bay College, University of Sierra Leone, Abdul Rahman Swaray stated that news writing and interview skills are very important to every journalist, thus significant that journalists know their angle in writing news.
He also highlighted that using the 5 W’s and 1H in writing news is very important as well as knowing critical interview skills.
A presentation on Media Law and Ethics was done by private legal practitioner and media practitioner, Joseph Egbenda Kapuwa, who maintained that every journalist must be familiar with the 1991 constitution, the 1965 Public Order Act, the Independent Media Commission (IMC) Act, and Code of Conduct for journalists.
He said journalists must be mindful of defamation in their reportage, adding that stories should be balanced, accurate, objective and credible.
Another presentation on the dress code for female journalists was delivered by Executive Director of Girl Child Network and gender activist, Anita Koroma. She said that dress code goes with character, character goes with credibility and credibility goes with integrity.
She admonished female journalists to be mindful of the way and manner they dress to attend events, especially when interviewing personalities.
“I cannot force anyone to dress properly, but it is the responsibility of every woman to dress properly,” she noted.