Strange! How 7 Journalists Died In 7 Days

CYRIACUS IZUEKWE

It had been strange seven days for Media Practitioners in Nigeria as seven journalists reportedly died in the last couple of days.

P.M.EXPRESS reports that for the seven days, the seven Nigerian journalists died as a result of COVID-19 and other illnesses averagely one in a day, which has caused serious panic in the media industry.

The journalists included Dan Foster (Cool FM Radio Station), Hugo Odiogor (former Editor at the Vanguard), Xavier Ndayongmong (Crime Editor at Daily Independent), Nkiruka Udoh (Crime and Defence Correspondent at AIT), Naomi Uzor (Business Desk at the Vanguard), Aramide Praise Oikelome (the Media Project and Independent Newspapers), and Azeez Ozi Sanni (Cartoonist at The Nation).

Nigerian Journalists have been facing huge risks and unprecedented challenges as frontline workers covering the Coronavirus outbreak and reporting in the newsroom every day.

Apart from facing the hazard of the work at this trying period, they are owed arrears of salaries and allowances by the different media organizations, who cannot cope with the economic situation over Covid-19 lockdown.

Most of them are married with children but can hardly feed their families thereby causing much stress and complications to their health which might have made them vulnerable to contacting ailments and dying easily.

At the moment, there appears no provision for insurance scheme by the Federal Government and State governments except private insurance scheme, which often can only be accessed as death benefits to families. Certainly, it is not the best of times for the Nigerian journalists.