Speakers at an annual press briefing in Rajshahi today said more local governance related media reporting is very important for making the local government institutions strengthened and vibrant.
They revealed that there are many instances of attaining positive result of strengthening the local government institutions through reporting based on local governance.Partner Sangstha, a women rights-based development organization, under its ‘Effective Participation for Transparent and Accountable Local Governance’ project organized the press briefing held at Public Library exposing the project activities. Main thrust of the media briefing was to sensitize the journalists on how to expose the present condition of the public representatives and gender sensible issues and depict actual extent of violence against women through media.In his project-briefing speech, Niamul Bari, Project Coordinator of Partner, said the media reporting is very helpful to draw attention of the policymakers to the plights of people of local government institutions and the women in particular. With Kazi Shahed, Convener of Gender and Development Journalists Forum (GDJF), Alima Khatun Lima, Director (Programme) of Partner, President of Rajshahi Union of Journalists Akbarul Hassan Millat, Project Coordinator Yeamin Ali, Monitoring Officer Golam Jakir Hossain and Gender Development Officer Nilufar Ahmed also spoke on the occasion.They said substantial and sustainable development of the rural people particularly the women is the precondition to bolster the rural economy through freeing it from the curse of poverty and hunger.Terming the public representatives as the closest of grassroots
people, they viewed that the hopes and aspirations of the grassroots people couldn’t be reflected until their institutional power and responsibilities were ensured.”We want to eliminate gender discrimination for more women empowerment,” said Alima Khatun.She mentioned that the issues of the women empowerment together with addressing women’s vulnerability are completely dependent on the substantial gender equality. “Media can play a vital role in this regard,” she added. -BSS, Rajshahi
