The News Agency of Nigeria(NAN) will soon start transmission in vernacular to widen its reach, its Managing Director, Malam Ali M. Ali, has said.
Ali disclosed this on Tuesday in Abuja while on a courtesy visit to Dr Aminu Wada, Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission(NCC).
He said that the 48-year-old agency would start with the nation’s three major languages – Yoruba, Igbo and Hausa.
According to him, the Hausa transmission christened ‘NANHausa’, will soon come on stream, with the others soon to follow.
“The goal is to reach everywhere. We want to bring in everyone. This is the digital era. It is the information age. We do not want anyone left out,” he said.
He said that the agency would soon start the broadcast of its news services as its broadcast licence would soon be put to use.
“We have a broadcast licence that has been lying fallow. We shall put it to use and start broadcasting the services we offer,” he said.
Ali said that the visit was to solicit partnership with the NCC since both outfits were communication giants.
“By partnering with NAN, NCC shall be working with the largest media outlet in Africa.
“We have a lot of products and services and shall make them available to NCC once this partnership comes on stream,” he said.
Ali listed the major services to include PR Wire Service, Photos, Archives, SMS and Features.
Others included Multimedia Services, NAN Forum, Live Coverage, among others.
He said that NAN was being repositioned to meet emerging challenges like Artificial intelligence, the social media onslaught and fake news.
“We are also intensifying efforts to bridge the gap between the government and the governed,” he said.
The managing director said that NAN would soon open district offices in every Senatorial District, while foreign offices closed down owing to paucity of funds funds would soon be reopened.
According to him, the London office would soon be reopened, followed by those in Ethiopia, Cote’d Voire and Eastern Europe.
He said that NAN was being expanded to compete favourably with its counterparts like Reuters, AP, Xinhua and AFP.
He commended Wada for achieving so much within a short time.
Ali particularly commended NCC’s increased interface with the media, pointing out that the measure had widened its reach and made its services more accessible to Nigerians.
In his remarks, Wada said that NAN occupies “a very important space in the media value chain”.
“NAN is everywhere. We have many media outfits that are regional outfits, but NAN is not one of them.
“We commend your efforts to promote the agenda of President Bola Tinubu.
“It is unfortunate that there are people that seek to misinterpret these hard decisions by the Tinubu administration.
“We are happy that NAN is helping out and bringing enlightened opinion to bear on national issues and discourse.
“We want NAN to keep the focus. An informed people is very important to national growth and development.
“Keeping the people informed is also very important to promoting public accountability,” he said.
He said that NCC shall be happy to partner with NAN in the efforts to enlighten Nigerians on global communication services.
“For instance, we want to spread the news that data management is purely in the hands of the owners.
“People keep saying that their data is being stolen. We believe that an enlightenment is necessary to avoid constant clashes between the consumers and the service providers.
“We buy lots of iPhones but these come at a cost. These high class gadgets translate to more data usage.
“We are also scrutinising the communication service providers. We want them to present their charges to the table so that the consumers can select.
“We want to know what they charge for calls, messages, video. It is good for consumers to have all the information they need.”
He said the registration of phone lines had recorded a huge success as the nation once had more than 90 million lines whose owners were not known.
According to him, the number has been reduced to less than 12 million.
He said that it was very important to know owners of telephone lines.
“Phone numbers have become very important to our lives. Let’s be able to know who owns each line. That will help our growth,” he said.
Mr Reuben Mouka, Director, Public Affairs in the NCC, in his remark, congratulated the NAN management for sustaining the tempo “in spite of the advent of the social media”.
“It is really wonderful that NAN stories still compete effectively with the social media.
“If you look at the newspapers, you will see NAN stories still hitting the headlines. This is really good,” he said.
In her remarks, Nneka Ukoha, Head, Corporate Affairs Department of the NCC, lauded NAN for standing the test of time.
“NAN has stood the test of time. The agency provides 50 per cent of news content in Nigeria.
“We are happy that NAN is still kept alive and doing very well.
“We have lots of concerns here. We are campaigning about data theft. We are telling people to know that the control of data is in their hands.
“We need reliable partners to help us in this campaign. NAN is certainly a good partner we shall like to work with,” he said.
