I’ll not retrench workers – Obaseki

Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki, has said his administration will not retrench workers of the state-owned media outfit but will make it formidable through training and retraining of staff.

The governor said this in Benin when the chairman of the Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Edo Council, Mrs Nefishetu Yakubu led the new executive on a courtesy call on the governor on  Monday.

‘’Our goal is to reposition Edo as an information hub in this part of the world and we are working to resuscitate the Nigerian Observer and Edo Broadcasting service.

“Nigerian Observer will be spit into two components, the Printing Press and the Publishing Company while the Midwest Newspaper Limited would also be restructured,” he said.

Obaseki explained that his administration did not believe in the retrenchment of workers, but to give them the opportunity to improve themselves through training and retraining, adding that staff will be retrained on digital reportage and publishing.

While assuring journalists of his support in the discharge of their duty, he said, he is a believer in press freedom hence he has never called any journalists to query a news report.

Earlier, Mrs Yakubu commended the governor for delivering the dividends of democracy to people of the state especially in providing conducive working environment for public service and investment in human capital development.

Yakubu said the visit was to present the new executives of the chapel to the governor and also to assure him of continuous, fair and balanced reportage of all government activities.