Our Journalism Has Gone Mad Again- By Abdulsalam Ibraheem Kehinde.

Nigeria before now, there used to be but a very reliable and informing pieces of news such that whatever news to be released would cut across the nation with a unique content and context without a contest between validity and doubt, or the question "hope this is real?" That was then; the time Nigerian news media had not gone mad at all, the time when journalists underwent rigorous researches and affirmation before any broadcast.

The spate in which misleading pieces of information are being conversely released to the society of Nigeria today has gone further to recede readers' interest about our news media and the real aim and goals of journalism have become a key in the mouth of a lion. That, within a week, as of now, faceless bloggers could release ten pieces of what we call "fake news" with catching, inviting, and well-purported headlines that easily arrest readers' attention. This uncouth act has often come to life by taking with a levity hand the news highly expected by the public. By way of citing instances, these bloggers once released news with the headlines: "FG Has Begun Distributing Money to the People as Palliative", " ASUU Has Called off the Strike ", " Ajimobi is Dead" among other unreligious misinformation. 

In a simple term, this malady has harmed the glory of journalism in Nigeria, and if urgent step by the Federal Government fails to come to stay, there appears on the horizon of prediction that ten to twenty years to come, journalism in Nigeria will boil down to nemesis or the living devil on the cross which everyone highly equipped will, by ten miles away, run from. The feasible dangers behind this are many; the first, foreign news will overtake our homemade media houses, second is that defamations of character would one day set wars on the rise once more. The third, the source of the livelihoods for real journalists will be jeopardized (and that would place unemployment/poverty on a high pace), and at the world's eye, self-control or lag of sustainability by the Nigerian Government will become slim.

Therefore, before the time, the Government needs to strategize how to preclude the impending dangers. Doing this, this heinous offence by these bloggers ought to be labelled against an inescapable penalty. For, the respect for the human community deserves being honorably valued. Government is expected to charge the Ministry of Information to be more strict, diplomatic, resistant, and put on the the list of priority the need to save the masses from heartbreaking information.

20/06/2020.