Feature/OPED

Criticism Highlights Russia’s Media Weakness in Africa

Published

6 years ago

03/08/2020

By Kester Kenn Klomegah

In her weekly media briefing July 23, Russia’s Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, criticised the United States support for educational programs, media and NGOs in Africa.

In addition, Zakharova said, “the allocation of grants fits into the White House’s efforts to promote the idea that there is no alternative to Western concepts regarding state governance and the imposition of alien values on sovereign states, and this represents another manifestation of neo-colonialism and an element of covertly formalizing inequality in the overall system of international ties.”

Russia’s position as contained in her briefing is available on the official website, and part of which is quoted here: “We have no choice but to comment and explain why we perceive this as Washington’s striving to eliminate the favourable regional socio-political background with regard to Russia that became particularly obvious following the Russia-Africa Summit in Sochi in October 2019.

“It appears that the United States is deliberately encouraging anti-Russia publications in some African media outlets and is trying to portray Russia as a destabilizing force. We are confident that such methods of unfair competition and misinformation show that there is no hard evidence confirming the so-called Russian policy of propaganda and misinformation, and this is also the consequence of weak US approaches in the field of public diplomacy.”

That well-said of the United States, it is equally important to note that since the Soviet collapse in 1991, the question of media representation both ways, in Russia and in Africa, has attracted unprecedented concerns and discussions.

Over the years, nearly 30 years after the Soviet era, Russia has not encouraged African media, especially those from south of Sahara, to operate in the Russian Federation.

On the other hand, Russian media resources are largely far from eminent in Africa, and these include the media conglomerate popularly referred to as Rossiya Sevogdnya (RIA Novosti, Voice of Russia and Russia Today), TASS News Agency and Interfax Information Service.

These are powerful and reputable Russian brands, compared to most well-known Western and European media organizations that operate in and cooperate with Africa.

Even not quite long, that was in November 2018, the State Duma, the lower house of parliamentarians, called for an increased Russian media presence in African countries, while Russia has closed its doors in offering opportunities for Africa media representation in the Russian Federation.

During the meeting that was scheduled to brainstorm for fresh views and ideas on the current Russia-African relations, State Duma Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin told Ambassadors from African countries: “it is necessary to take certain steps together for the Russian media to work on the African continent.”

“You know that the Russian media provide broadcasting in various languages, they work in many countries, although it is certainly impossible to compare this presence with the presence of the media of the United States, United Kingdom and Germany,” Volodin said, and promised that the State Duma would create the necessary legal basis for this long-term media cooperation.

Experts say that neither Russia has an African media face nor Africa has a Russian media face. Thus, in the absence of suitable alternative sources, African political leaders and corporate business directors depend on western media reports about developments in Russia and from the developed world.

Interestingly, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Information and Press Department has accredited media from Latin America, the United States, Europe and Asian countries, and only two African media came from the Maghreb region (Morocco and Egypt) in North Africa.

The official information presented during the first Russia-Africa Summit, held in October 2019, explicitly showed the degree of priority given to African media.

Some 300 media bureaus from 60 countries are currently operating in Russia, including 800 foreign correspondents while there are only two African news bureaus from Egypt and Morocco, according to Artem Kozhin, who represented the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Information and Press Department, at the panel discussion on media.

According to his interpretation, this extremely low representation of African media hardly meets the level of current dynamically developing relations between Russia and Africa.

“We invite all interested parties to open news bureaus and expand media cooperation with Russia,” Kozhin said at the gathering, inviting Africa media to Moscow.

Nearly all the panellists noted precisely that western media dominates in Africa. “Oftentimes, unique news offerings created by the Russian media simply do not make to the users and viewers in many regions, including Africa.

“Evidently, this vacuum gets filled with one-sided information from other players in the media market. This information can be biased, or outright hostile towards Russia and residents of other countries,” said Mikhail Bogdanov, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation and Special Presidential Representative for the Middle East and Africa.

During the Russia-Africa Summit, Professor Alexey Vasiliev, the first appointed Special Representative of Russian President for Relations with Africa (2006-2011) and currently the Head of the Center for African and Arab Studies at the Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia (2013-2020), told the audience there in Sochi: “Africa is largely unaware of Russia since African media mainly consumes information the Western media sources and then replicates them. And all the fake news, the Rusophobia and anti-Russian propaganda, spread by the western media, are repeated in the African media.”

“Measures are needed to enable us to better understand each other,” suggested Professor Vasiliev, who regularly advises the Presidential Administration, the Government of the Russian Federation, both chambers of the Federal Assembly, and the Russian Foreign Ministry.

Some experts have consistently argued that Russia has discriminated against the media from sub-Saharan Africa. That trend remains unchanged even after the first Russia-Africa Summit, held in Sochi with the primary aim of helping identify new areas and forms of cooperation, put forward promising initiatives that would bring collaboration between Russia and Africa to a qualitatively new level and contribute to strengthening multifaceted cooperation between the two regions.

Let that be the acceptable case, but both Russia and Africa have basic questions that still need quick answers. The questions raised at the panel discussion on media in Russia-Africa gathering: What issues are currently encountered in the formation of the modern media landscape? What role does the media play in Russian-African relations? What are the prospects for collaboration in the information sphere? What needs to be done to develop a Russian media agenda in Africa? What is the role and place of Russia in the information space of Africa today? What role can African media play in promoting further Russia’s image in Africa?

In practical terms, the highly successful spade-work was the first Russia-Africa Summit. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has to layout some new mechanisms and adopt a more favourable approach that could readily attract African media to operate in the Russian Federation.

Russia and Africa need to examine every sphere based on shared partnership interests and redefine a practical approach to realizing whatever plans on media cooperation. Media and NGOs, as instruments for improving adequately public knowledge, especially on developments and emerging opportunities, have not been persuaded to match the desired future objectives and policy goals.

The stark reality is that Russia needs Africa media and Africa needs Russian media, in order for them to enlighten ties in the economic spheres, to promote a better understanding among African elites and the middle class through media reports. The middle class is twice Russia’s population and almost the size the population of the United States.

Professor Vladimir Shubin, the former Deputy Director of the Institute for African Studies, explained in an interview with me that political relations between Russia and Africa, as well as the economic cooperation, would continue to attract more and more academic discussions. Such scholarly contributions, in essence, would help deepen understanding of the problems that impede building solid relationship or partnership with Russia.

In order to maintain this relationship, both Russia and Africa have to pay high attention to and take significant steps in promoting their achievements and highlighting the most development needs in a comprehensive way for mutual benefits using appropriately the media, according to Professor Shubin.

“African leaders do their best in developing bilateral relations,” he added. “Truly and passionately, they come to Russia more often than ten years ago, but a lot still has to be done; both Russian and African media, in this case, have a huge role to play.”

Perhaps, one of the reasons why some African leaders appear to have “written off” Russia has been lack of adequate information about Russia, or rather plenty of distorted information they have received from the Western media coverage of Russia, Professor Shubin concluded.

“Russian media write very little about Africa, what is going on there, what are the social and political dynamics in different parts of the continent. Media and NGOs should make big efforts to increase the level of mutual knowledge, which can stimulate interest for each other and lead to increased economic interaction as well,” said Fyodor Lukyanov, Editor-in-Chief of the Journal ‘Russia in Global Affairs’ and also the Chairman of the State Council on Foreign and Defense Policy.

“To a certain extent,” Lukyanov said, “the intensification of non-political contacts may contribute to increased interest. But in Russia’s case, the main drivers of any cooperation are more traditional rather than the political interests of the state and economic interests of big companies. Soft power has never been a strong side of Russian policy in the post-Soviet era.”

Similarly, Bunn Nagara, a Senior Fellow of the Institute of Strategic and International Studies, member of the Valdai Discussion Club, has observed that “Russian businesses face a number of challenges. First, there is little information available internationally about the opportunities and possibilities for partnerships between Russian and foreign businesses.”

“Russia is a large country spanning both Europe and Asia. So, it can do much to bring Asian and European business linkages together and build on them. Better public relations and improved information dissemination are very important. To do this, it needs to do more in spreading more and better information about its achievements, the progress so far, its future plans, and the opportunities available,” Bunn Nagara said.

Early October 2019, the Valdai Discussion Club released an ebook titled “Russia’s Return to Africa: Strategy and Prospects” jointly or collectively authored by Vadim Balytnikov, Oleg Barabanov, Andrei Yemelyanov, Dmitry Poletaev, Igor Sid and Natalia Zaiser.

The Valdai Discussion Club was established in 2004, with a goal is to promote dialogue between Russian and international intellectual elite and to make an independent, unbiased scientific analysis of political, economic and social events in Russia and the rest of the world.

The authors explicitly suggested the need to take steps in countering Western anti-Russia clichés that are spreading in Africa and shaping a narrative whereby only dictators and outcast partner with Russians. Therefore, efforts to improve Russia’s image must target not only the continent’s elite but also a broader public opinion. It would be advisable to create and develop appropriate media tools to this effect.

Media and NGOs, working with the civil society, have to support official efforts in pushing for building a positive image and in strengthening diplomacy. Displaying an attentive and caring attitude towards the African diaspora in Russia, the key objective is to overcome racist stereotypes that persist in marginal segments of Russian society. Helping highly qualified educated African migrants to integrate through employment. This will, in addition, showcase and shape public opinion about Africa in the Russian Federation.

According to the authors, building a more and consistent positive public opinion within Russia and Africa should be considered extremely important at this stage of relations between Russia and Africa. Should Russia assist other countries for political purposes only? Will the recipient countries be willing to lend Russia their political support, and can they be trusted? Should Russia build its partnerships exclusively based on the principle of economic expediency?

The authors wrote: “Russia will have to answer these questions as it moves towards implementing its African strategy. Its experience in working with public opinion and governments across Eurasia to shape public perceptions will come in handy in Africa.”

In the context of these existing challenges, leaders on both sides have to draw a roadmap. Inside Africa, Africans have had enough of all these public debates. The time has come to make progressive changes to the current approach, create a new outlook or simply call it “media facelift” instead of maintaining the old status quo. It, therefore, means taking concrete practical steps toward an effective media cooperation, this will substantially not only broaden but deepen two-way understanding of current developments in Russia and in Africa.

The irreversible fact is that there is the need to have an informed African society, and this has to be done largely, systematically and necessarily through the media. Africa has the largest number of young people, who look at the world with open eyes and are ready for cooperation with partner countries. This is a good opportunity to inform the young generation, bring them together through knowledge from Russia, Eurasia, and Africa. According to UN forecasts, Africa’s middle class, constitutes a very huge vibrant information-consuming market, will exceed 350 million by 2025.

Kester Kenn Klomegah writes frequently about Russia, Africa and the BRICS. Most of his well-resourced articles are reprinted elsewhere in a number of reputable foreign media.

Feature/OPED

The Role of TV in Preserving African Stories and Identity

Published

1 hour ago

24/06/2026

Business Post Contributor

Scroll through social media today, and you will notice something interesting: everyone is either reacting to a series, quoting a movie line, or debating a character as though they personally know them. Beneath the memes and binge-watch culture, however, lies something deeper. Television remains one of the most powerful tools shaping how Africans see themselves, remember their history, and tell their own stories. In a continent as diverse and expressive as Africa, that matters more than ever.

TV as a Cultural Archive, Not Just Entertainment

Long before streaming algorithms began shaping our viewing habits, television was already preserving African identity. From Nollywood dramas that capture the rhythm of everyday Lagos life to documentaries exploring Maasai traditions and Ghanaian folklore, TV has served as a living archive of the continent’s stories.

It preserves more than entertainment; it preserves language, culture, humour, values, and shared experiences. Unlike fleeting social media content, television allows stories to unfold with depth, exploring the realities of family, tradition, ambition, and modern African life without reducing them to stereotypes. That is the power of TV: preserving not just stories, but perspective.

Why Representation on TV Still Matters

There is a subtle but important truth: if people do not see themselves on screen, they may begin to believe their stories are not worth telling. This is why African TV content is more than entertainment; it is affirmation.

Seeing a character who speaks like you, struggles like you, or celebrates like your community does something powerful. It validates identity and challenges outdated narratives that have historically defined Africa through external lenses.

This is where MultiChoice Group, through platforms such as DStv and GOtv, plays an important role. They do not simply broadcast content; they help distribute cultural memory at scale.

GOtv, DStv, and the Everyday African Viewer

Think about a typical evening in many African homes: the TV is on in the background, someone is laughing at a comedy show, another person is watching a local series, and someone else is catching up on the news. That shared viewing experience remains very real.

Through platforms such as DStv and GOtv, African households are exposed to a blend of local storytelling and global content. More importantly, they have helped amplify African-produced content by bringing Nollywood films, African reality shows, talk shows, and documentaries into mainstream rotation.

It is not just about access. It is about visibility.

A young filmmaker in Lagos today is more likely to believe their story matters because they have seen similar stories broadcast widely. A child in Accra grows up hearing familiar accents and seeing environments that look like their own on screen, not as exceptions, but as the norm.

TV Is Also Shaping Modern African Identity

African identity is not static; it is evolving. Television reflects that evolution in real time.

Today, audiences see:

Young Africans balancing tradition and modern dating culture
Stories tackling mental health in African households
Fashion and music influences spreading through TV series
Political satire shaping public conversation

Conversations that were once confined to homes are now being explored on screen, giving audiences the language to discuss issues that were previously unspoken.

In many ways, television is doing what oral tradition has always done: passing stories, values, humour, warnings, and history from one generation to the next. The difference is that today’s griots are writers, directors, and broadcasters.

The Future: From Watching to Owning Our Narratives

The next stage of African storytelling is not just about being seen; it is about ownership.

As more African creators produce content and platforms continue to invest in regional storytelling, television becomes more than a mirror. It becomes a tool for shaping how Africa is represented to itself and to the world.

While streaming continues to grow, television, particularly accessible platforms such as GOtv, remains one of the most effective ways to reach everyday audiences across different income levels and regions. After all, storytelling only matters if people can access it.

African stories are not new. They have always existed in families, on streets, in markets, in history books, and through oral traditions. What television has done, and continues to do, is give those stories a stage wide enough for millions to experience them at once.

The next time you watch a local series or documentary on DStv or GOtv, remember that you are not just being entertained. You are participating in the preservation of African identity itself.

Feature/OPED

The Future of AI in Nigerian SMEs: Overcoming Barriers to Implementation

Published

1 day ago

23/06/2026

Business Post Contributor

By Kehinde Ogundare

Ask a tech entrepreneur in San Francisco what AI means for their business, and they are likely to talk about competitive advantage, product differentiation, and scale. Ask a small business owner in Kano or Onitsha the same question, and the conversation shifts entirely.

For many Nigerian SMEs, the priority is keeping the lights on, managing costs, and finding sustainable ways to grow in a challenging economic environment. This difference in perspective explains why the global AI conversation, often shaped by assumptions about stable infrastructure, deep capital, and abundant technical talent, frequently fails to address the realities facing Nigerian SMEs.

This matters because Nigerian SMEs are not a peripheral concern. In 2024 alone, MSMEs contributed 46.32% to Nigeria’s GDP, accounting for 96.9% of businesses and 87.9% of employment. These businesses are the backbone of the Nigerian economy, and if AI is going to mean anything for Nigeria’s development, it has to work for them in the daily conditions they actually operate in.

However, research drawing on empirical data from 144 Nigerian SMEs found that inadequate infrastructure, low digital literacy, skills shortages, and regulatory gaps are collectively preventing them from meaningfully engaging with AI. Awareness of AI is high and growing. What is missing is a clear and honest conversation about what adoption actually requires in this specific context. The barriers are real, but none of them are insurmountable. The question is whether the tools, pricing models, and support structures being offered to Nigerian SMEs are designed with those barriers in mind, or whether they have been built for another market entirely.

Subscription models making AI affordable for small businesses

When most small business owners hear “AI,” they imagine expensive software, specialist consultants, and a hefty upfront bill.

That assumption is not entirely wrong, but it describes a particular way of buying technology, not AI itself. The shift that makes AI genuinely accessible at the SME level is the move away from large, one-time capital purchases towards tools that charge a predictable monthly subscription. Businesses can pay for what they use, scale back when necessary, and avoid the debt that a major technology investment can create.

The deeper opportunity here is consolidation. Many SMEs are already spending money across multiple disconnected tools—one for invoicing, another for customer records, another for stock tracking—none of which talk to each other. An integrated platform that handles several of these functions together, with AI built in, can actually cost less than the sum of those separate subscriptions while giving business owners a clearer picture of their operations.

With margins already under pressure, any technology a business adopts needs to visibly show an increase in productivity or bottom line. Subscription-based, integrated platforms, priced transparently and honestly, are the model that best fits this reality.

Infrastructure challenges demand a mobile-first approach

No conversation about technology in Nigeria is complete without confronting the infrastructure problem, and AI is no exception. Nigeria continues to face major infrastructure barriers, including limited broadband access, unreliable power supply, and high data costs, all of which constrain deeper AI adoption. These are structural features of the operating environment that any sensible technology strategy must account for today.

The electricity situation alone is significant. The World Bank estimates that the lack of stable electricity costs Nigeria’s economy approximately $26.2 billion annually, equivalent to about 2% of GDP, forcing many businesses to run on expensive diesel generators. That cost ripples outward.

In practical terms, AI tools built for Nigeria cannot assume a stable broadband connection or a computer that is always powered on. The tools that will actually get used are the ones that work on a smartphone, consume minimal data, and can function offline when connectivity drops, syncing back up when it returns. The mobile phone is already how many Nigerian SME owners run their businesses. AI that meets them there, rather than demanding infrastructure they do not have, is AI that has a genuine future in this market.

The direction is clear: build capability from within, using tools that make that possible. Recent AI performance research reveals that 64% of African workers are already actively using AI at work, signalling massive grassroots readiness and driving forward-thinking organisations across Nigeria, Kenya, and South Africa to aggressively prioritise internal upskilling frameworks to bridge the talent gap.

As the policy groundwork is being laid, the commercial ecosystem is beginning to respond. What remains is a clear-eyed acceptance that AI tools built for this market need to look different from those built for markets with different realities. Low cost, low bandwidth, and usability for non-technical people are not modest ambitions; they are the actual requirements. Build for those realities, and AI has a real future in Nigeria’s SME economy.

Feature/OPED

When Leaders THRIVE: Yetunde B. Oni’s Candid Counsel to Lateef Jakande Leadership Academy

Published

5 days ago

19/06/2026

Business Post Contributor

Union Bank’s Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer sat with 30 of Nigeria’s most promising young leaders for a frank conversation on character, relationships and the discipline of growth.

Out of 25,000 applicants, only 30 earned a place. That single figure tells you how rare the room was when Yetunde B. Oni, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Union Bank of Nigeria, recently sat down with a cohort of the Lateef Jakande Leadership Academy.

The Academy, a Lagos State Government initiative established in honour of Alhaji Lateef Kayode Jakande, the state’s first civilian governor, exists to raise a generation of ethical and capable young leaders. Its fellows are drawn from across professions, sectors and ethnicities, and shaped through a fellowship facilitated by the Africa Leadership Initiative, West Africa (ALI WA), whose work on values and principled leadership has become a quiet engine behind some of the country’s most thoughtful emerging talent.

It was into this gathering that Mrs Oni brought not a corporate address, but a conversation. Honest, personal and at times disarming, she spoke about the philosophies that have carried her through a career spanning more than three decades, the setbacks she has had to surmount, and the values that opened doors she never expected to walk through.

She gave them a framework to hold on to. She called it THRIVE.

The six principles

T — Take ownership of your relationships. Leadership, she argued, begins with the deliberate stewardship of the people around you. Relationships are not incidental to a career. They are infrastructure.

H — Honour God. She spoke openly about faith as a steadying force, an anchor that keeps ambition tethered to something larger than the self.

R — Recharge and refresh. Mental and physical health, she insisted, are not luxuries to be deferred until the work is done. Leaders who neglect their well-being eventually have less to give.

I — Invest in your growth. Continuous and heavy investment in personal development is, in her telling, the price of staying relevant. The learning never ends.

V — Value your work. She pressed the fellows on identity and brand. What do you stand for? Do you create value? Who, in truth, are you? The questions were not rhetorical.

E — Embrace setbacks. Failure, she said, is not the opposite of progress but a part of it. The leaders who endure are the ones who learn to metabolise disappointment rather than be defeated by it.

The people behind the leader

If one theme threaded the entire conversation, it was relationships. Mrs Oni was candid that she did not arrive at the top of Nigerian banking alone. She credited the steady support of family, her parents and her husband, alongside the mentors, friends, coaches and sponsors who shaped her at different stages.

She drew a sharp and useful distinction between a mentor and a coach, two roles often conflated and rarely understood, and she traced much of her progress back to a foundation of Nigerian cultural values: hard work, honesty and integrity, courtesy and respect. These, she told the fellows, are not relics. They are the very qualities that have earned her trust and opened doors throughout her journey.

“You need people,” was the message, delivered without sentiment. Relationships, she explained, must be managed and nurtured with the same seriousness one brings to any other discipline. Time must be managed with equal care.

On believing, and risking

Perhaps the most resonant moment came when Mrs Oni spoke about self-belief. She admitted that becoming the MD/CEO of Standard Chartered Bank, Sierra Leone, did not cross her mind – not because she was unqualified, but because she didn’t think she would get it. Encouraged by her husband, she applied anyway, and she got it!

That appointment would later see her make history as the first woman to lead a Standard Chartered Bank operation in her market.

The Union Bank of Nigeria appointment told a similar story. She had not even known the position existed after the CBN’s intervention. It came to her through relationships; through the quiet networks of people who knew her work and recommended her name while she was unaware in faraway Sierra Leone.

The lesson she left with the fellows was unambiguous. Believe in yourself. Take the risk. Put in for the thing you are not yet certain you deserve, because the opportunity you are waiting for may be one you cannot see, reaching you through someone you have not yet met.

Why this matters

Engagements of this kind are easy to underestimate. They produce no headlines about balance sheets and no immediate line on a financial statement. Yet they speak to something Union Bank has long understood: that institutions endure when they invest in people, and that leadership is built one honest conversation at a time.

Credit is due to the Africa Leadership Initiative, West Africa, whose facilitation of the Lateef Jakande Leadership Academy continues to shape young Nigerians of real promise, and to the Academy itself for the rigour of a process that turned 25,000 hopefuls into 30 fellows ready to lead.

For Yetunde B. Oni, the afternoon was less about what she had achieved than about what she was willing to give: her time, her story and her counsel, offered freely to those coming after her. It is, in the end, what the best leaders do. They light the path for the next generation, and they THRIVE.