Dreams can come true

Today marks the beginning of something new. Sorry, I take that back. There is nothing new under the sun. Most of the innovations we have today are just a re-combination of what has been ─ as many trend experts will tell you. But when I say something new, I mean a new way of making you enjoy what you are already familiar with. I heartily welcome you to the world of TheCable, Nigeria’s top-class online newspaper conceived to deliver knowledge-based journalism.

What’s new? We have set out to be professional, to be innovative and to be fair-minded in the way we practise our journalism. We want to make journalism an enjoyable experience for the reader. We want citizens to be fully involved in finding solutions to our common problems. We want knowledge and reason to be the foundation of public discourse in Nigeria. We want less of emotions and prejudice in the way issues of national importance are discussed. We want a better society ─ where the leaders and the people can have a consensual, mutually beneficial relationship.

Why did we choose online journalism? I have been asked this question again and again. Having been a newspaper journalist all my life, I am naturally expected to set up a newspaper. In that case, TheCable is a newspaper. But it is not a printed newspaper. Just imagine TheCable as a newspaper without the newsprint. The same way you listen to music these days without playing a cassette or a CD. It is still music, isn’t it? Now we’re on the same page.

My romance with journalism has a bit of a long story. I developed interest in journalism at a very tender age. My earliest memories date back to the 1983 elections. I was a little boy in secondary school then and I was on holiday in Lagos. I watched Verdict ’83 on NTA every night to monitor the election results. As the results were being announced, my grandmother started lamenting bitterly to me that the elections had been rigged by President Shehu Shagari.

What happened next? I was so angry and sad that I tore four pages from my 2A exercise book and started writing to attack the Federal Electoral Commission (FEDECO). I can’t remember if I wrote in Yoruba or English. If it was in English, it must have been some pretty nonsense. I started getting drawn to reading newspapers. My uncle always brought home a bunch of papers from the office. I was reading more than 10 newspapers a day. Daily Time alone was printing more than 500,000 copies in those days.

Today, no newspaper prints 500,000 copies. More people are reading news online. I started buying newspapers in my secondary school days. Today, I just wake up in the morning, pick up by smart phone and read all the papers without leaving my house. By 7am, I am fully informed of what is in the papers. As news breaks during the day, of course I cannot afford to wait till the following day to be fully informed. I visit several websites to keep myself up to date.

TheCable is positioned to be Nigeria’s preferred online newspaper. Our dream is to be the most popular online newspaper in Africa. That is some ambition, right? We are determined to get there. We have given ourselves a one-year target to establish ourselves in the market and become a dominant player. Just remember: dreams can come true.

Kolawole is the Founder & CEO of Cable Newspaper Ltd