HIV+ Journalist addresses Nigerian seminar

Nigerian journalist Fred Adegboye addresses WACC seminar on Communication and AIDS

by Philip Lee

Toronto, 2 April (WACC) -- Speaking to participants at a seminar on ‘Trends on HIV and AIDS and Communication in Nigeria’, Fred Adegboye has called for people living with HIV/AIDS to become educators.

Discriminated against for being HIV positive, Fred is an example of what successful media advocacy can do to change a person’s life. Local media campaigning gained him a place at the Nigerian Institute of Journalism where he studied for a Diploma in Journalism and Mass Communication.

Some 25 church-related communicators attended the two-day seminar, which took place 20-21 March 2006 in Lagos, Nigeria. The seminar preceded a meeting of the Executive Committee of WACC’s Africa Region.

A leading organization in the media struggle is Journalists Against AIDS Nigeria (JAAIDS), founded by Omololu Falobi. Tragically he was killed in October 2006 during an armed robbery while returning home after a speaking engagement.

Falobi founded JAAIDS in 1997 to increase and improve national coverage of HIV/AIDS by working directly with journalists to better their training and access to information. Fred Adegboye wants to continue that work.

‘I intend to work for social justice in Nigeria,’ he told seminar participants. ‘The media can be used to set agendas and to put moral pressure on the government, especially in regard to people living with AIDS.’

In 2005 it was estimated there were 220,000 deaths from AIDS, and 930,000 AIDS orphans living in Nigeria. There has been an alarming increase in the number of HIV positive children in recent years, 90% of whom contract the virus from their mothers.

Currently very few Nigerians have access to basic HIV/AIDS prevention, care, support, or treatment services.

Stigmatisation is still the problem of the day. But there is general recognition that the media can play a central role in creating awareness and understanding of HIV/AIDS, as well as in sensitizing and mobilizing people against the epidemic.