The Foundation For Investigative Journalism and Social Justice (FIJ) has organised a one-day training for early-career journalists on the use of journalism to drive social justice in Nigeria.

The programme, titled ‘Journalism for Social Justice’, took place in Lagos on Thursday with support from the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism and the MacArthur Foundation.

‘Fisayo Soyombo making a presentation at the event

Facilitators told the 25 undergraduates and early-career journalists in attendance about the need to produce quality, critical and impactful stories to curb impunity and the excesses of leaders.

READ ALSO: FIJ Wins Google GNI Innovation Challenge

During the first session, ‘Fisayo Soyombo, the founder and editor-in-chief of FIJ, described his background as an investigative journalist and his organisation’s evolution. Soyombo said that although there are numerous journalists, the world is constantly in need of public-interest journalists.

Participants at the event

“The most important currency of a journalist is integrity, which seems to be in short supply. After then is the writing ability; this is secondary,” he said.

Abdumalik Adesokan, FIJ’s monitoring and evaluation officer, spoke on the importance of measuring the impacts of social justice stories.

Abdumalik Adesokan engaging participants

“We need to measure the impact of our stories because it lends credibility to our work and also helps in industry development. The act of measuring one’s impact can also attract investment and funding,” he said.

He also said journalists can use different techniques to assess the impacts of their stories.

During his second session, Soyombo encouraged participants not to be discouraged if the change they desire in society seems impossible.

“We all desire change, but the change might not be permanent in some instances,” he said. “But if people read your story and know the extent of the problem, that is a form of change.”

READ ALSO: WANTED at FIJ: News Impact Editor and Reporters

There was also a review session during which participants expressed satisfaction with the training.

Participants said the training was informative and they would have liked to see more journalists attend.