ABSTRACT

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

Development in all its ramifications is a product of peace. Society without unity, peace

and understanding between and among its inhabitants cannot boast of development. Peace is

integral and very central to the development of any nation. Development is simply an increase,

improvement, and growth for the better. Development is a self-generating and self-sustaining

phenomenon. Therefore, development is conceived in human term as the maximum satisfaction

of basic human needs of adequate and decent food, water, electricity, shelter, education, modern

social infrastructural facilities (Development administration, 1998, Yunusa & Okene, 2008).

The word ‗media‘ comes from the plural of the Latin word medium and it is used as a

collective noun to refer to television, radio, newspapers, magazines, films, the international

networks (internet) etc. The media, in both specific and general terms (the Newspapers,

Television, Magazine, radio, social media and the internet as a whole) has always played and is

still playing very prominent role in national growth and development. Media helps to develop

societies by gradually changing and making them to become more advance, greater, stronger,

larger, successful and impressive entities.

Apparently, media exert a powerful influence on its audience, their actions and inactions;

also exert same on the perceptions of the world around them. The role of the media is to report

and disseminate authenticated and objective information. This information must be factual,

accurate and balanced and fair representation of divergent views, to allow the audience or larger

public to make well-informed choices (Coffman et. al, 2006) and judgment. The media plays a

wide range of roles in our lives. Some of these roles are constructive and some are destructive.

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Media is often described as a double-edged sword. When employed positively, media can

become an instrument of conflict resolution and a catalyst for peaceful change. However, when

employed as a means to propagate intolerance and hatred, and to incite violence, media becomes

a negative force among efforts to foster peace (Coffman et. al, 2006). It has remained an

indisputable fact that the mass media or media of mass communication are among, if not the

most effective and powerful means of disseminating information all over the world. Countries

that are seen to be powerful or developed are perceived as such, largely owing, among other

things, to the powerful media they possess and control (Bello, 2005:177).

Media owners and professionals decide what they think the public or some target

audience want to see and hear. A common journalistic principle is: ―If it bleeds, it leads.‖ That

means violent conflict will be headline news, not news of cross-cultural dialogue and

understanding. The media mostly covers conflict, not peace building. This tendency to cover

conflict and violence distorts reality and leads many people to think that conflict is pervasive and

peace is abnormal. History has shown that the media can incite people toward violence. Hitler

used the media to create an entire worldview of hatred for Jews, homosexuals, and other

minority groups. Rwanda‘s radio RTLM urged listeners to pick up machetes and take to the

streets to kill what they called ‗the cockroaches.‘ Broadcasters in the Balkans polarized local

communities to the point where violence became an acceptable tool for addressing grievances.

The media‘s impact on the escalation of conflict is more widely recognized than the media‘s

impact on peace building (Bratic and Schirch, 2007).

Journalism does not need justification for its existence. Its service to society is

justification in itself. Journalism can not only help to distribute information but also counter

hate-speech and create an environment of balanced opinions, and information equilibrium. For

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the media it can be problematic to find a balance between preventing harm caused by speech and

protecting individual expression. Being able to find this balance however is important especially

in conflict situations. Responsible journalism does not just re-publish press releases but is truly

concerned with a truthful, balanced and fair account of events (Kuusik, 2010). In order to

achieve this journalists have to stay clear of judgemental representations and describe reality