Some delegates at the ongoing 13th All Nigeria Editors’ Conference in Port Harcourt, Rivers State on Friday urged journalists to put in place viable post-retirement investment initiatives.
The participants spoke while discussing a paper: “The Editor as a Businessman,” presented by Chooks Oko, the Editor-in-Chief of Citizens Trumpet Newspaper.
Gbenga Aruleba, the Head of Current Affairs at African Independent Television, who chaired the session, urged journalists to be conscious of their imminent retirement.
Aruleba stated that the essence of the session was to educate editors on how they could be successful in business after active service.
“The editor is already a successful journalist, so what we are looking at is how we can also be successful in business,” he said.
Idang Alibi, a former staff of Daily Trust, said journalists aiming to be in business must be frugal in order to manage their capital maximally.
Alibi also said running a viable business requires doggedness, adding that focus must be on the particular kind of portfolio to invest in and developing the right attitude to succeed in it.
He said: “If you don’t have passion for a particular business, you don’t have to do it, so there will be no need for you to venture into what you don’t have passion for.
“You need to be patient because it takes a long time for you to be successful, so you need to undergo apprenticeship.
“Even as an Editor, you must have undergone serious training in addition to the experience you had as a reporter or correspondent.”
Alibi also said the essence of investing in business was to improve income generation in order to meet needs.
He added: “Even as editors, we need money to meet our daily needs, so business is to make rich people out of poor people.”
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