Based on the papers presented, study group works and discussions, participants of West African Institute for Financial and Economic Management (WAIFEM), has made a joint communique and observations that will help to empower media parishioners in order to make their jobs effective and efficient.
 
The following observations and recommendations were made in Lagos, Nigeria after a week-long training of twenty-nine journalists, editors, publishers, broadcasters, among other stakeholders.

The media parishioners recommended that some media practitioners and journalists engaged in financial and economic analysis and reporting, lack adequate knowledge and skills required to perform  media’s watchdog role effectively; that it’s difficult for journalists to access information, or are often given substandard information which they are unable to verify, due to road blocks and hindrances put in their way by bureaucrats, that there is strong restrictions by governments in the sub-region to disclose government and national data and information, thus constraining the media from engendering an informed national discourse on national issues that would enhance the options of the electorate in exercising their democratic civic duties.

It was also recommended that the legislatures in Ghana and Nigeria are dragging their feet in passing the freedom of information bills for those countries; the quality and depth of public discourse on economic and financial issues between the media practitioners and policy-makers depend largely on the intellectual agility of the former and the financial and economic information available to them, that media houses, particularly the private media, are still grappling with financial resources to meet basic logistics support to keep their media houses running talkless of building the analytical capacity of staff; that the various governments of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) are not doing enough to economically empower women who are in the majority, thus making the attainment of 2015 Millennium Development Goals (MDS’s) very difficult, that operators in the informal sectors, and the citizens of the community in general, are not sensitised on the activities of WAMZ. It also noted that they are not involved, informed, educated or carried along in the integration process, and specifically, sometimes immigration officers at the border posts, who are expected to know better, are among the worst offenders of the Ecowas protocol arrangements.

That adherence to the rule of law, probity, accountability and transparency in political and economic governance in the sub-region is improving, albeit at a snail’s space; and that the relatively low “economic quotient” of the media practitioners is barring them from better informing the governed on government policies and practices, thus performing their role as the public watchdog less effectively.

In light of the foregoing observations, the participants, recommended that the donor community and governments in the sub-region are enjoined to resource WAIFEM and other training institutions in Africa to conduct sustainable programmes in financial and economic analysis for journalists, as trained journalists would engender a better informed electorate, that countries in the sub-region are urged as a matter of urgency, to accelerate the passage and ratification of a Freedom of Information Act, particularly in Ghana and Nigeria, that the private and public media houses in countries of the sub-region should be given equitable access to government news and advertisements in order to disseminate current developments and derive the financial wherewithal to attract the human and material resources to enable them perform their functions effectively.

It further pointed out that there is a strong necessity for greater awareness by policy-makers in the sub-region of the importance of mainstreaming women in national development.

It also indicated that efforts must be redoubled by the policy-makers to ensure that the signed Ecowas protocols are not violated by officials at the lower end of their institutional hierarchies, with particular reference to immigration officers at check points, airports and borders, noting that governments and the media should embark on effective public sensitisation to make issues of the WAMZ integration process more widely known and debated.

The communique stated that the auditing functions in public institutions should be given greater emphasis and prominence, to enthrone due diligence in the management of public resources.

That governments and the media must lead concerted campaign at building morally upright and conscientious citizens by de-emphasising the acquisition tendencies which lead to pubic and private sector corruption, and that media practitioners are urged to set up networks, aimed at propagating best practices in the profession.

The participants extended their heartfelt appreciation to WAIFEM and the African Capacity-Building Foundation (ACBF) for maintaining the media as a constituency in their efforts to build capacity in economic and financial management in the sub-region.