‘Daily News’ Proprietor Tasks Gambian Media To Be Independent

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By Ndey Sowe
Madi MK Cessay, proprietor of ‘Daily News’ who also doubles as Director of ‘Media Agenda’, has called on media organisations in the country to graduate from ‘being fed’ to ‘feeding itself’.
Ceesay said this on Monday September 9th 2019, at the opening of a five-day media training for young female journalists.
The Media training for female journalists is a 20, 000 USD project with funding from UNESCO, and aims to train thirty young female journalists from various media houses in the country. This is the second phase of the project with the first phase that took place in Juffereh in the North Bank Region (NBR) last April comprising fifteen participants.
Participants were drawn from the Women Journalists Association of the Gambia (WoJAG) and the Network of Community Radios.
“My advice to the two main beneficiary organizations was for them to engage themselves in project writing exercises so that they can begin to implement their projects,” he said; that ‘Media Agenda’ will be willing to offer technical and expert support should the need arise. He further called on participants to take the training seriously.
Meanwhile, Ceesay urged participants not to expect that the five-day training can turn them into full-fledged journalist.
“Five days of training is far from being adequate to turn one into a full-fledged journalist. The project is a Media Agenda project and does not belong to any other media organization,’’ he said; that Media Agenda is not affiliated to any media organization in the country.
Momodou S. Ceesay, the National Assembly Member for Janjanbureh said the training targets female journalists who are doing extremely well in the media industry; that few female journalists can make it to senior managerial positions.
“I urge you to take the training seriously so that together, we can take the media to higher heights,” he said.