Afreximbank 'schools' 18 African journalists on Intra-African trade and finance reporting

The African trade and regional integration have been identified as critical factors for Africa’s development.

The recognition of this important fact was underscored by the recent signing of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement.

Despite the gains, it is shocking to note that African trade and financial issues continue to remain under-reported in the media.

A situation contributing largely to availability of very limited awareness or lack of information about markets across the continent.

In a bid to help address the challenge to ensure smooth flow of information leading to easy facilitation of trade among African countries and between Africa and the rest of the world, the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) has held a two-day intensive training workshop for 18 selected African journalists in Casablanca, Morocco from 7 to 8 November 2018.

Dubbed "Media Workshop on Intra-African Trade, Business and Financial Reporting”, was aimed at building capacity of African journalists to give prominence to and effectively report on issues pertaining to intra-African trade and finances.

Addressing participants at the opening, Executive Vice President, Business Development and Corporate Banking, Afreximbank, Mr. Amr Kamel noted the workshop form part of his outfit’s ongoing effort to position and work with the media to advance the course of development across Africa.

He maintained that the objective behind organising the workshop is to strengthen skills and knowledge of journalists to produce fact-based reporting on intra-African trade and on business and financial issues relating to Africa as a way of closing the information gap.

While identifying the unique role of the media in “carrying the message on intra-African trade transactions from policy makers to the people and, in turn, gather feedback from the people and feed the same to the policy makers”, he concluded: “without the media, it will be almost impossible to have free flow of ideas and information".

In all, 18 selected journalists who work as business/financial reporters for established media organizations within 7 African countries namely, Ghana Nigeria, Egypt, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Kenya, Morocco and Senegal were equipped with the needed knowledge and skills to shed light on the issues.

The participants include Thierry Ekouti, Le Quotidian(Zimbabwe),Uchechukwu Usim, the Sun Newspaper (Nigeria), Lucy Nwachukwu, News Agency of Nigeria(Nigeria), Mathew Dadiya, Daily Times(Nigeria), Leah Katung-Babatunde, NTA (Nigeria), Chijioke Nelson, the Guardian(Nigeria), Joseph Kobla Wemakor, Ghananewsone.com(Ghana), Seth Krampah, B&FT(Ghana), Abdou Diaw, Le Soleil Business(Senegal), Brian Ngugi, Business Daily(Kenya), Isaac Khisa, the Independent(Nigeria), Kalonde Nyati, Daily Mail(Zambia), Ristel Tchounand, La Tchounand La Tribune d’Afrique(Morocco), Bassey Udo, Premium Times (Nigeria), Ebere Nwoji, This Day (Nigeria), Collins Nweze, the Nation(Nigeria), Manal Ahmed Omar Abdel Hafez, Al Alam AI Youm(Egypt) and Francis Arinze Iloani, Daily Trust Newspaper (Nigeria).

The 2-day workshop witnessed the combination of theoretical teachings with the experience of decades-long career in covering subjects specific to African, trade, African and global business and financial developments.

It was conducted by Mr. Obi O. Emekekwue, Director & Global Head of Communications and Events Management, Afreximbank with support from Mr. John Chiahemen, a renowned Media & Communication Consultant, Nice View Media and Dr. Luke Anorue, Senior Lecturer, University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

The selected reporters were taken through topic such as: “Intra-African Trade, Business & Financial Reporting Africa: The State of Play", " Telling Story: How to capture the Intra-African Trade Story for Your Audience" including "Practical Lessons in Financial & Business Reporting in Africa: Incorporating Intra African Trade".

The participants, better equipped to tackle the challenges of reporting on African trade issues, particularly in the context of the opportunities presented by the African Continental Free Trade Agreement, expressed profound gratitude to the bank for the sponsorship.

In a jubilant mood, each of them was handed a certificate of participation at the end of the workshop.

Speaking to participants, Afreximbank’s Director & Global Head of Communications and Events Management, Mr. Obi O. Emekekwue averred that the media has a significant role to play to bring about change through continuous highlighting issues of intra-African trade and regional integration to ensure Africa’s development.

He said the bank believes journalists can achieve dreams through harnessing their power and influence of reach and ability to reach the mass public with news and by focusing attention on the issues of trade in Africa to help create the much-needed awareness and bring the necessary information to the trading public.

It further believes until its goal can be achieved, the media practitioners ought to understand Intra-African trade issues and have a solid grasp of financial and business reporting techniques at their fingertips.

Mr. Obi Emekekwue therefore charged the African media practitioners to focus attention on intra-African trade and finances issues including the African Continental Free Trade Agreement and report on them accurately to keep the information flowing in order to help bring about the needed development in Africa.

The workshop was organized on the sidelines of the banks 18th Annual Structured Trade Finance Seminar/ Workshop brought together CEOs, MDs, and senior management level personnel of banks, financial institutions and other entities involved in promotion of trade across from Africa who equally had fair share of the capacity building in the areas of technical skills and knowledge necessary to deal with risks in financing trade under a difficult politico-economic environment and changing trade counterparties including other intra-African trade and finances related issues.

The African Export-Import Bank(Afreximbank) is a trade-finance-focused-focused development bank established in Abuja in October 1993 by African governments, African private and institutional investors, and non-African investors as a multilateral trade development institution to finance and promote intra-African and extra-African trade.

It is the foremost Pan-African multilateral financial institution devoted to financing and promoting intra-and extra-African trade with the overall objective to improve quality of life in Africa.