A former Communications Director for the Confederation of African Football (CAF), Suleiman Habuba, has advised sports journalists to come out of their ‘local’ shelves and position themselves for a global world, as information technology has made the profession more open.
Habuba, now a consultant and also into oil and gas, also advised sports journalists in Africa to use their medium to enhance the image of sports on the continent instead of being carried away by what happens in the western world.
Habuba gave this advice in Accra when he was in Ghana as a Special Guest of the Sports Writers Association of Ghana (SWAG) and also to receive a special award on the 42nd MTN-SWAG Awards.
“Social media has made it possible for us to access information on sports globally. It has also presented us with the chance to do same for others who know every little about African sports stories. We have to tell our own and it is important that we position ourselves in a manner that make our stories positive and credible, particularly as we head into the FIFA World Cups, where Africa is set to get its slots increased,” Habuba said.
“Being a sports journalist is an interesting but also a highly responsible job. People are passionate about sports, particularly, football and it behoved on those informing people and educating them to get the right information and not be carried away by sensationalism because in the end, it could have a toll on the integrity and credibility of the media practitioners and their channels.
He said it was crucial, particularly for the electronic media to be mindful of the dos and don’ts when it came to covering events such as the World Cup which was a high media broadcast event and any flaunting of the laws on media rights could have dire consequence for journalists.
