The need for governments at all levels and the media to always collaborate has been emphasized especially where the issue of mitigation of flood risk is involved.
The Oyo State Commissioner for Information, Culture and Tourism, Toye Arulogun, made this assertion on Tuesday while speaking on the imperatives of government-media partnership in development at the opening of a three-day workshop on the role of media in mitigating flood risk in Ibadan.
The three-day workshop organised by the Ibadan Urban Flood Management Project (IUFMP) is to sensitize media practices on the roles of informing, instructing and eliciting peoples’ participation on government policies especially in relationship to reorientation and enlightenment.
IUFMP was set up by Senator Abiola Ajimobi, the Oyo state governor with funding support from the World Bank as a special purpose vehicle to address all issues pertaining to flood; its cause, risk reduction, mitigation and sustainability in Ibadan.
He stated that the role of government is to provide legal and social framework for implementation of policies, adding that dearth of visionary and development-oriented government, declining professionalism in media role and practice, lack of confidence in government, poor understanding of government policies, blind objectivity, sensationalism and commercialization of news report are key challenges to development
Arulogun advocated for synergy as the only way to engender growth and development in the state.
In his welcome address, the Commissioner for Finance and Budget, Bimbo Adekanmbi represented by the Permanent Secretary in the ministry, Musa Olawoye, stated that flood is one of the major natural hazards likely to generate disaster, adding that Ibadan had been experiencing flooding for a long time with the first recorded in 1951.
He added that successive governments have been engaging in palliatives which merely amounted to redressing the damage done to hydraulic infrastructure by cushioning the losses without remedying the fundamental causes of the menace until the Ajimobi administration designed a comprehensive and deep-rooted solution to the problem through IUFMP.
“The project is already delivering masterpiece civil works across Ibadan and is leading the charge in addressing the human and hydrological causes of flooding; indiscriminate waste disposal, erection of building on waterways, blockage of rivers with a slit as well as dysfunctional damage,” he said.
He concluded that the workshop is apt based on the central place occupied by the media in the task of curtailing perennial flooding in Ibadan, adding that the forum is a veritable platform to rub minds on how to engage members of the public with media messages.
Packaged by Olayinka Agboola with additional reports from tribuneonline.com
