Journalists build capacity on digital public infrastructure
A three-day capacity building workshop for journalists in Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) issues begun yesterday in Accra.
Organised by Media Foundation for West Africa and funded by Co-Develop, the DPI fellowship workshop aims to enhance the knowledge and skills of the selected journalists in producing impactful stories on DPI and Digital Public Goods (DPGs) in the country.
The workshop formed part of the second phase of the Digital Public Infrastructure Journalism Programme where 45 journalists from media organisations in four countries were selected to participate in the programme.
Opening the programme, the Executive Director of MFWA, Mr Sulemana Braimah, said DPI or DPG fellowship programme aims at increasing public awareness and access to information on DPGs.
He said it also sought to promote and ensure that the uptake and adoption of DPI in West Africa was “inclusive, safe and equitable.”
According to him, DPIs and DPGs were the most important, critical, and relevant development issues of this generation, and organisations like media need to educate the public about these infrastructure and systems.
“So as journalists, we think it is important you understand these issues, write and report about them, analyse them, ask critical questions, interview beneficiaries to know their concerns, their challenges, so you can also educate the public about the DPIs and DPGs to help them make informed decisions,” he said.
This, Mr Braimah stated would help build an ecosystem that was enabling and empowering to not just for a few, but everyone including people in rural communities.
“There are still people who are in the rural areas who are being told to go to the regional capital to get a Ghana card due to digital disparities, this are the kind of stories we need to report on and bringing them to the public domain to help find solutions to these issues.”
And that is why we are grateful for this opportunity Co-Develop is providing for our journalists to help them understand these issues, so that together we can build an ecosystem that will ensure that digitisation is positive for everybody rather than maybe positive for a few and negative for the majority,” the Executive Director said.
BY CECILIA LAGBA YADA
