PRINT MEDIA REPRESENTATION OF THE ROLES OF WOMEN IN IFE-MODAKEKE AND AGULERI-UMULERI COMMUNAL CONFLICTS IN NIGERIA

Abstract

Print media representation of the roles of actors in conflict is a global phenomenon. In Nigeria, the print media reportage of community conflicts, including Ife-Modakeke and Aguleri-Umuleri conflicts, revolves around the causes and nature of conflict and the roles of men as principal actors, with scant attention paid to the roles of women. This study was designed to examine print media representation of the roles of women in the Ife-Modakeke (1997-2000) and Aguleri-Umuleri (1995-1999) conflicts and explore their unreported roles in both conflicts. John Galtung’s War/Violence and Peace/Conflict Journalism Theory guided the study, while the case study design was utilised. The heterogeneous sampling technique was employed to generate data from five newspapers (Nigerian Tribune, Daily hampion, The Guardian, Punch, and Daily Times), two magazines (TELL and The NEWS) between 1997 and 2000 for the IfeModakeke conflict, and the Aguleri-Umuleri conflict 1995 and 1999. The first two newspapers were selected because of their proximity to the conflicting communities and others for national spread. Fifteen Key Informant Interviews (KII) conducted with traditional leaders (one traditional ruler and five chiefs), two ex-fighters, two elders, three union leaders, one teacher and one researcher and four Focus Group Discussions (FGD) were purposively selected for their roles in each conflict. Descriptive statistics were used to analyse the quantitative data from print media, and a sixteen-item coding sheet comprising eight analytical categories for each journalism frame was used to content analyse information from news articles. Feminist curiosity was utilised to examine the camouflaged (unequal) gendering of power in the unreported roles played by women from KII and FGDs. The percentage-point difference in the categories of reportage between Ife-Modakeke and Aguleri-Umuleri conflicts consists of straight news (76%; 70.19%), editorials (4.47%; 7.69%), Features (14.78%; 16.35 %) and letters to the editor (4.81%; 5.77%) respectively. In both conflicts, women were represented as victims of destitution and displacement. Conversely, their representation in the Ife-Modakeke conflict were as victims of rape, divorce, riot and arson, while in the Aguleri-Umuleri conflict, they were portrayed as victims of maternal mortality, forced marriages and subjects of traditional oaths to forestall divulgence of security information to relatives. Unlike being represented as victims, women in the Ife-Modakeke conflict were reported to be financers of peace-making initiatives, peace petition writers and pellet removers. Likewise, in the Aguleri-Umuleri conflict, they were reported as peace brokers and participants in traditional oath-taking to resolve the conflict. The unreported roles of women in the four communities include similar roles as petition writers, protesters, information sources, medical providers, and advisers. In Modakeke and Ife communities, virgin girls and elderly women relied on juju to protect and enable the male fighters at the battlefronts, while in Aguleri and Umuleri communities, women served as disguised fighters and weapon-carrying aides. Although the media largely portrayed women as victims in Ife-Modakeke and AguleriUmuleri conflicts, the women described themselves as advisers, enablers, protectors and fighters. Therefore, journalists should interact directly with people in conflict settings to understand and accurately report the roles of different actors.