COMMUNITY GREEN RADIO ORGANISES TRAINING FOR JOURNALISTS IN BASICS OF HEALTH REPORTING

Monday, August 23rd, 2021 | By

As COVID-19 pandemic ravages Ugandans, National Association of Professional Environmentalists (NAPE) has intensified the move to train Albertine reporters on health reporting and promoting public access to fact-based information during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The training was aimed at equipping journalists with essential skills to effectively serve as frontline workers during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

During the training, that was held at the radio premises in June, Julius Kyamanywa, Community Green radio station manager stated that the training is timely for the media sector to expose disinformation and misinformation related to the pandemic in Uganda.

“This training is timely and gives an opportunity to journalists to learn and avoid misinformation. It helps us learn to identify right sources of credible information”, he explained.

Professor Adolf Mbaine, a lecturer from Communications Department at Makerere University said journalists need to report on health based on facts and figures to avoid misleading the public.

“When you are equipped with facts and figures, you are good to go since you will be reporting from an authoritative point of view”, the Professor explained.

The training targeted journalists under the Albertine Journalists’ Platform (AJOP). AJOP was formed in March this year to build the capacity of rural journalists on reporting issues that affect communities.

 AJOP, which is hosted by Community Green Radio, has over thirty radio journalists from radio in Hoima, Kibaale, Kagadi, Kakumiro, Buliisa and Kiboga.

Allan Kalangi, the Manager of the NAPE Sustainability Programme under NAPE says such trainings act as refresher courses for practicing journalists and enhances their capacity to serve communities better.