Harness social media for the propagation of Islam, Afolabi urges Muslims

By Ridwan AREMU

The guest lecturer at a 2-day media workshop for Muslim Organisations put together by Hatbuk Media Production, Publisher of News Live Nigeria, Ustaz Afolabi Moroof has urged Muslim Organisations to harness social media for the propagation of Islam.

Ustaz Afolabi stated this on Saturday 5th September 2021, while delivering his lecture for the workshop titled “Muslims in the Commity of Nations: Leveraging on the Media Advantage”.!

Afolabi added that, Muslims and Islam are always painted black by some sections of the society with the use of social media, maintaining that crises that lead to the death of Muslims are under reported but over-reported when it involves the other side of the divide. He attributed this to inability of the Muslims to use social media effectively for the propagation of Islam.

“Anytime a dispute between Muslims and other faiths leads to death of the former, such dispute is reported in a way that makes it overwhelming, but if a Muslim is killed in such a crisis, the media report it less. ”

Afolabi further stated that, the media are against Islam and this must be taken seriously by all Muslims. He cited Bosnia war that happened on April 6, 1992 where over 200 thousands people were killed and over 2million people were displaced, as a case of the media “war” against Islam. The war was under reported despite the fact that thousands of people were killed.

The lecturer affirmed that mosque makes reporting of story easy and Muslims should work for Allah by all means.

While suggesting ways out of this precarious condition, Afolabi stated that, every Muslim Organisation should have media department to communicate with the public, employ manpower to handle such department, have a clear cut budget, organise training and workshops, maximize the positive use of social media, create media outlets like Facebook pages, Instagram and others and seeking more useful knowledge.

Earlier in his address, Publisher of News Nigeria, Bukola Hameed admonished participants at the workshop to see the media as a veritable tool for the propagation of Islam and should be maximally harnessed.

The Day-1 of the media workshop featured other presentations by Yusuf Adua,one of the correspondents of NLN, who spoke exhaustively on “WHAT IS NEWS” and Ridwan AREMU of NLN, who lectured the participants on News Writing and Reporting.

The 2-day media workshop that started on September 4th, 2021 is billed to end on Sunday September 5th 2021, where participants shall be issued Certificates of Participation.