CJID will launch a new initiative, Countering Disinformation and Empowering Democracy in Northwestern Nigeria, to combat misinformation in the North-west and North-central regions of Nigeria. The initiative will focus on media literacy education, journalism capacity building, open-source intelligence, artificial intelligence-assisted verification, local-language engagement, and grassroots community mobilisation.
SPECIAL REPORT: Nigeria's maritime university upgrade stalls as billions flow into repealed academy Oil-well Dispute: Inside the report that restores Cross River's hope EditorialContent monetisation: The internet is rewarding harm, and women are paying the price, By Chioma Agwuegbo CJID Executive Director Akintunde Babatunde said the initiative would deploy a coordinated package of interventions, combining media literacy education, journalism capacity building , open-source intelligence (OSINT), artificial intelligence-assisted verification, local-language engagement, and grassroots community mobilisation.
The initiative, titled Countering Disinformation and Empowering Democracy in Northwestern Nigeria, targets Sokoto, Zamfara, Katsina, and Kebbi State in the North-west, and Niger State in the North-central, with officials describing the North-west region as sitting at a dangerous convergence of insecurity, poverty, low literacy, and rapidly spreading online falsehoods. Speaking at the launch, Xenia Stoll, political officer at the EU Delegation to Nigeria and ECOWAS, said disinformation had evolved well beyond a media challenge into an active instrument of destabilisation.
In his remarks, the Board Chairman of CJID and immediate past Vice Chancellor of the Federal University Kashere, Umaru Pate, painted a stark picture of the information environment in the North-west, warning that the region's structural vulnerabilities, displacement, economic hardship, youth frustration, and porous borders made it a fertile ground for manipulation. He noted that while radio remains deeply influential across the region, WhatsApp increasingly drives local discourse at scale, enabling manipulated narratives to cross rapidly between the digital and physical worlds.
"Rumours, inflammatory content, fabricated security alerts, and hate-driven misinformation often spread faster than facts can follow," Mr Pate, a professor of media and society, said. "In fragile and polarised contexts, disinformation no longer functions merely as a communication problem. It increasingly contributes to fear, mistrust, communal tensions, democratic erosion, and insecurity.
" CJID Executive Director Akintunde Babatunde said the initiative would deploy a coordinated package of interventions, combining media literacy education, journalism capacity building, open-source intelligence (OSINT), artificial intelligence-assisted verification, local-language engagement, and grassroots community mobilisation. Specifically, the programme will train teachers as frontline media literacy educators, strengthen the verification and conflict-sensitive reporting skills of journalists and broadcasters, establish campus fact-checking networks, and expand community outreach through radio and WhatsApp-based campaigns
Policy Media & Journalism CJID Media Literacy Journalism Journalism Capacity Building Counter-Disinformation Empowering Democracy Northwestern Nigeria
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