0
208

Two professors to revive Zik’s West African Pilot

 

Two United States-based Professors Dr Chris Ulasi and Dr Anthony Ogbo on Tuesday revealed plans to revive the West African Pilot founded by Nigeria’s first President Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe.

Ulasi and Ogbo, both from the School of Communication, Texas Southern University, said the new West African Pilot News would revive the spirit of Zik and Pan Africanism.

Zik established the West African Pilot on November 22, 1937, mainly to fight for Nigeria’s and other African countries’ independence from British rule.

He edited it from 1937 to 1947, but the newspaper, with its motto, “Show the light and the people will find the way”, went out of business in 1967 following the outbreak of the Nigerian Civil War (1967–70).

Ulasi, and Ogbo said the new West African Pilot News would invoke the same fighting spirit of the 30s “to once more give the common man a voice over a surmounting political, social, and economic environment.”

In a statement yesterday, they said the first project was the Pilot Media Inc., an American-based multinational mass media corporation with focus mostly in News, television, and film.

The next was the West African Pilot News also Pilot News structured as a political, community, and business-focused, English-language international news site based in Houston, Texas, United-States targeting news and events in the Sub Saharan Africa with emphasis on Nigeria.

The motto of the West African Pilot News is ‘The spirit of investigative journalism.’

According to Dr. Ulasi, “In an era with the influx of technology applications and availability of inexpensive publishing tools, the news industry has been under the threat of awfully substandard news delivery. Our platform is a trusted information hub for Africa and the African diaspora.”

Dr Ogbo said, “Protection of the First Amendment rights might not just be enough in sustaining a free society. We must also give people the platform to tell their stories their way. We are bound to fail when allow others to tell our stories.”

According to Ogbo, “we have arrived, and we are sustaining the indefatigable spirit of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe and what was left of the Pilot in 1967.”

The duo said they had assembled more than 200 writers across all disciplines to facilitate columns and blogs.

“Reporters are also in place to represent various cities, political interests, and ideologies.

“For example, The Pilot Business (PB), is structured as a West African leading financial outlet, furnishing readers with routine corporate, financial, economic, and political news; Pilot TV is broadcast online, targeting news and events in the Sub Saharan Africa with emphasis to Nigeria; the Africa Pilot reports African to the World and the World to Africa.”

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here