MFWA empowers regional journalists against misinformation

Journalists have been urged to build robust fact-checking skills against information disorder; one of the leading threats against democracy. 

An increasing Internet penetration in the country has led to the advent of fake news, disinformation, misinformation and mal-information with the ability to pollute the public sphere and wreak havoc on Ghana’s democracy, a lecturer at the Department of Communication at the University of Ghana, Legon, Dr Theodora Adjin-Tettey Dame, said.

He expressed this concern during a two-day intensive training in Ho on Fact Checking organised by the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), for selected journalists drawn from the Volta, Eastern and Oti regions.

The workshop formed part of a series of trainings by the MFWA for 125 journalists across the country on fact-checking and countering mis /disinformation in Ghana with funding support from the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO). 

It is to enhance the knowledge of journalists on the phenomenon and improve their skills for analysing content and producing fact-check reports.

A facilitator at the training programme, Dr Dame explained that limited knowledge among journalists and a lack in the skills to counter mis/disinformation content, partisan polarisation of the Ghanaian populace and a vibrant, pluralistic media with high levels of unprofessionalism, further exacerbated the challenges of information disorder.

Disinformation

She quoted an Afrobarometer Survey across 14 countries which found that about 75 per cent of respondents were more likely to believe fake news and disinformation.

Dr Dame said as of January 2022, Internet penetration in Ghana had risen to 53 per cent, with 8.80 million social media users.

She noted that the pervasiveness of information mis/disinformation was, however, global and extended beyond politics to all aspects of information including climate change.

Mostly, driving forces such as monetary gain, political gain, online followership and ideological reasoning, among others are major motivation for sensationalism and conspiracy theories which continue to do damage even through traditional media, Dr Dame.

She said journalists, therefore, owed the citizenry the duty of robust fact checking in order to maintain a good level of sanity in the information sphere.

Practical sessions 

A journalist with the Fourth Estate news organisation, Seth Bokpe, exposed the participants to various fact checking and verification tools including TinEye, Yandex, Invid Fake News debunker tools, and TruthNest among others.

He said the importance attached to garnering the requisite skills in producing and publishing accurate information was important, due to its role of empowering journalists in doing impactful and good journalism.

“Journalism plays an important role in the development of our democracy.

It is important that we improve on the capacity of journalists to enable them to do ‘critical journalism,’ which should push for change and development,” Mr Bokpe said.

The training was concluded with several practical sessions and a fact-checking contest between participants.