The executive secretary of the Nigerian Press Council (NPC), Dr Dili Ezughah, has described the removal of the agency from the national budget as a huge setback.
Ezughah stated this when the House of Representatives Committee on Information, National Orientation, Ethics and Values, paid an oversight visit to the council headquarters in Abuja.
He lamented that the development had brought untold hardship to the staff of the agency, with many of them withdrawing their children and wards from school due to inability to pay school fees.
The executive secretary expressed appreciation to the committee members for their efforts to salvage the situation, while stressing the urgent need for a correction of what he described as misclassification.
According to him, the NPC was wrongly classified as a professional body, when it is actually a regulatory agency.
He further briefed the committee on the reform taking place in the council, especially the recent creation of a marketing department to boost internal revenue generation, as well as a fact – checking app in the works.
He explained that the app, when developed, would check misinformation and disinformation on the social media.
The chairman of the House Committee on Information, National Orientation, Ethics and Values, Mr Fatoba Olusola, pledged the commitment of the committee to ensuring the reinstatement of the NPC to the budget.
Fatoba said the committee would do everything possible to empower the council to effectively perform its statutory functions.
He also said the enabling legislation would be revisited to see the areas that could be amended for an optimum performance of the agency.
The Nigerian Press Council, alongside all the professional associations, was removed from the 2024 Appropriation Act.