Vice President Kashim Shettima, has advised media professionals in Nigeria to be more focused on objectively speaking truth to power rather than antagonising the government.

Distinguishing antagonism and speaking truth to power, he also urged members of the fourth estate of the realm to, as a matter of necessity, always strive to strike a balance between their allegiance to self and truth.

Shettima who gave the charge on Saturday during the Public Presentation of the Book, “Persona Non-Grata,” authored by a seasoned journalist, Mr. Ismail Omipidan, in Abuja, said the goal must hinge on serving a greater good and deserving humanity.

According to him: “What must be spelt out is that there is a distinction between antagonising a government and speaking truth to power. The latter is driven by a noble principle to serve a greater good and deserving humanity.

“The former, on the other hand, is usually a self-serving exercise that fades into futility, and that is not the end we should aspire to achieve with the information and ideas we labour to acquire and process in our line of work”.

Taking a leaf from “The Republic,” a Socratic dialogue, written by the Greek Philosopher, Plato, the vice president pointed out that to build a nation that can best be described as an ideal state, the intellectual class, especially the journalists, must be allowed to be the nation’s conscience.

Shettima specifically told journalists that apart from speaking truth to power, the nation also needs them, as media professionals, to serve as the country’s conscience.
He said: “No political leader, however sincere their intentions, can excel beyond the scale of the knowledge at their disposal, and this is particularly telling in our political space.

“While we need an army of courageous media professionals to speak the truth to power, we also need them to serve as the conscience of the political institutions and individuals who influence the evolution of society, including the questions of our collective survival.”

The vice president however observed that the real courage required to serve as the conscience of the nation “lies in resisting compromise in one’s pursuit of truth.

“True courage is being able to tell the truth even in a congress of critics and bullies. The rush to partake in a smear campaign, even in the face of superior facts, is, of course, not an act of courage. This distinction sets courage apart from cowardice. It takes rare integrity to recognise the difference between the two ‘Cs’, he stated.

While urging both leaders and media practitioners, as well as other well-meaning citizens to “aspire to learn where and when to draw the line between courage and cowardice,” Shettima described the author of the book, Omipidan, as a journalist who “has shown that, in reporting the ups and downs of his nation, true allegiance isn’t to oneself, but to one’s society.

Describing the book, “Persona Non-Grata”, as “a declaration of the price of adhering to noble principles even in the face of corrupting temptation,” the vice president pointed out that the book is not “a record of the journey to being cancelled for telling uncomfortable truths.”