Media War Against Trump: Time For Rapprochement
There is a new lexicon in politics and media in the United States and indeed the world. It is called,
Fake News. Thanks to United States President, Donald Trump, even Nigeria’s
political elite has caught the bug.
Nigeria’s Minister of
Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said recently that the threat
posed by the fake news phenomenon is greater than that posed by insurgency and
militancy, hence the need for the military to strategise on how to counter it
with the same vigour with which it confronted Boko Haram. Boko Haram is a
terrorist group operating majorly on the North East of Nigeria.The Minister stated this in Abuja on Tuesday at the 7th National Security Seminar of the Alumni Association of the National Defence College.
“I see a greater threat to Nigeria and the threat is greater than insurgency and militancy, and that is fake news. I think anybody who is a student of history or military history will agree with me that no war has ever been started by bullets or bows and arrows. Every war has been started by words. This phenomenon of fake news is a serious issue and I think the Armed Forces should also pay a great attention to it,”' he said.
Alhaji Mohammed urged the military to devise a robust communication strategy and deploy more and capable personnel to the Social Media to wage a cyber warfare against fake news.
“This is why I believe that whatever we do today in fighting terrorism and insurgency, we must pay adequate attention to communication strategy. We must have our people who will be very active also on the Social Media,” he said.
According to Wikipedia, fake news “is a type of hoax or deliberate spread of
misinformation be it via the
traditional news media or
via social media with the intent
to mislead in order to gain financially or politically. It often employs eye-catching
headlines or entirely fabricated news-stories in order to increase readership
and online sharing.”
While fake news has been in existence
for a very long time, not much was made of it until Donald Trump.
The mainstream media played into
Trump’s hands by their biased reportage of the events leading to the United
States presidential election last year. Many of the liberal news media from
Washington Post, New York Times and CNN among others were spinning lies upon
lies to show that the Democratic Party candidate, Hillary Clinton would win. Many
of these were absolute lies. Not even one of the presidential debates could
these news mediums acknowledge that Trump won. In fact they regale the world on
why Trump was unelectable. Listening or reading them and their hugely partisan
columnists and pundits, you would be pardoned to suggest that there was no need
for the election, just inaugurate Hillary Clinton as the president.
While the CNN and co. was busy
spreading their jaundiced news, the people that matter, the American people who
Trump’s message was resonating with were getting set to precipitate the most
unprecedented knock out of the American establishment. It was a bemused and
utterly embarrassed so-called main stream media that received the shock of
Trump’s victory at the presidential election. Trump by his victory did not only
embarrass the establishment and their media backers, he embarrassed the Polling
Industry, that would never be the same again.
Now you would think that the media has
learnt its lesson after their loss. Alas that was not to be. They have
continued their relentless attack against Trump, opposing all his policies. The
game is to prove that Trump is incompetent and to tell his voters, “We told you
so!”.
Trump being a man who doesn’t suffer
fools gladly he had decided to take the gauntlet and embark on massive attack
against the media. He uses every opportunity to remind whosoever cares to
listen that the media is the enemy of the American people. The media wants the
retention of the status quo.
It is easy to understand Trump’s
anger towards harbingers of fake news. They not only spin things out of proportion,
they sometimes make things up. A case in point was the allegation that CNN
reporter was interviewing his camera man, who was posing as a protester on the
streets. If that was true, it shows how unethical many of these media organisations
are.
However, despite Trump’s legitimate
concern over the behaviour of sections of the media, he cannot throw away the
baby with the bathwater. He has to be accommodating to all sections of the
media. The ethical misconducts he complains about have been noted by the
American public, who are among the most highly discernable people in the world.
Trump should note that the media is indispensible in a democracy. Trump cannot
fight them and win. Let it not be said that under Trump, a man who will
indisputably make America Great Again and the world safer, that people from
outside including Third World countries where media crackdown is common, will
be advising American government to respect the media and accord it all the
rights to do their job without hindrance.
Let there be no more banning of sections
of the media from the White House. While I can understand Trump’s refusal to
attend White House Correspondents’ dinner, given the prevailing animosity
against his government by some media organisations, I do hope that he would be
there next time. That dinner by his absence has lost its essence. I recall that
it was in such gathering that President Obama mocked Trump in 2011, and see
what God has turned Obama’s laughter that night to. According to the UK Sun
Newspaper many political commentators believed that Donald Trump launched his presidential bid to
get revenge on Barack Obama after he publicly poked fun at the businessman
during the 2011 White House Correspondents dinner. Whatever may be the
case, the world has entered the Trump era. This new era should not be
distracted by media antagonism. Let the media allow Trump to do his job and let
the White House allow the media do theirs.
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