AFYMP Trains Campus Journalists

On Wednesday, the Africa Foundation for Young Media Professionals (AFYMP) conducted a training for campus journalists at Leadwort Hotel, Port Harcourt.

The trainees, batch B members of the AFYMP training programme, were selected from various universities in the South-South and South-East.

Graced with a host of speakers, the training began with a lecture by Yinka Olaito, the CEO of Michael Sage Consulting Communications & Media.

Mr Olaito, who spoke on “The Search for a Game Changer,” said Game Changing aims to change the narrative of brown envelope journalism in the minds of young journalists.

He advised the trainees not to be afraid to try new things. “Failure is part of life, you can’t be prosperous if you can’t take risks, because successful people fail more than unsuccessful people,” he said.

Another keynote speaker, Dr Hannah Amah, spoke on “The Strategies for Building a Media Business Model in a Volatile Age and Building Media Brands.”

She discussed tips for building brands and relationships, processes, challenges, and opportunities of media branding.

Dr Amah explained that in building a model and relationship, journalists should be honest, quotable, and accessible. She also said that they should offer exclusives and provide photos. 

Headquartered in Nigeria, the AFYMP is a pan-African, non-profit initiative established to raise the standard of media professional practice in Africa.

It is a media skill development, mentoring, debate, awards, and discussion platform which aims to create budding raw materials that will equip the upcoming and middle-level/established media professionals in the African media industry. 

Seventy per cent of the organisation’s activities are targeted at students of Media, Communications and Public Relations, while 30% are designed for upcoming/young media practitioners with five years of experience or less.