Charity trains journalists to highlight plight of people seeking help

A German based charity organisation, Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), has organised training for journalists to produce documentaries highlighting the plight of people needing help in the country.

This is contained in a statement by Rev. Fr. Patrick Alumuku, Director of Communications, Catholic Archdiocese of Abuja, in Thursday.

The participants included journalists from Catholic Television of Nigeria in Abuja and Jos.

Mr Pawet Warigora, Director Catholic Radio and Television Network based in Poland, stated that the workshop was to strengthen and upgrade the skills of the participants.

He said that the training was to prepare the journalists to partake in the organisation’s ‘Five Film Project’ to be carried out in Nigeria later in the year.

“We at the ACN have two campaigns every year to raise funds to support the people who are in need in different parts of the world.

“The first campaign is done during the Advent season and the second one is done during the Lenten season.

“These campaigns are done using short video and documentaries to highlight the plight of the people around the world and seek for help for them.

“For Nigeria, we have five projects we will want the Catholic television to carry out on behalf of the ACN.

“That is why we are organizing this workshop to train you all in this area.

“Our style of documentary film production is to use a two minutes video to highlight the plight of people around the world”, he said.

The Regional Manager of CRTN, Mr Jacek Komorowski who was one of the facilitators at the workshop, took time to highlight salient points on how to carry out documentary interviews to get the desired result.

“In this type of documentary interview, the director needs to prompt the protagonist to say something that will elicit sympathy and emotion.

“But first, research is key to achieving this, research gives you the ability to dig deep into issues and how it affects the society.

This type of interview captures the cause, effects, progress and a call to action,” he added.

The Director, Catholic Television of Nigeria, Rev. Fr Patrick Alumuku who was also at the workshop, appreciated the ACN for the collaboration between the two organizations.

According to him, the knowledge from the workshop will help CTV staff to improve their production skills proficiency beyond the Lenten campaign plan.

During the week-long workshop held in Ghana, participants were taught practical techniques on documentary film production.

They are expected to produce five documentaries in Nigeria by November.(NAN)