Telecom
COVID-19: Group Urges Employers To Prioritise Welfare Of Journalists
With the world losing over 15, 000 to death due to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and the number of people infected rising, an advocacy group under the aegis of Times Journalism Alumni Association(TJAA), has called on employers of journalists globally, especially those under whose employ its members serve, in Nigeria and Africa to place a high premium on the welfare of this category of workers who risk their lives daily to inform, educate and entertain the world.
Intervening against the backdrop of increasing cases of the COVID-19 infections worldwide, , Clifford Agugoesi, chairman of TJAA noted that journalists are always on the go and must really stretch themselves to limits to be available where the news is happening and to be able to report this accurately, timeously and this peculiarity of their job exposes them to great risk and many have actually paid the supreme prize in the pursuit of professional duties and excellence.
“We urge employers of journalists to treat them with greater respect, compassion and dignity as no time in the history of mankind has the vulnerability and gullibility of humans, particularly our colleagues and members, being so exposed as under the COVID-19 crisis period.
“We specifically call on employers of journalists and our members in Africa in general and Nigeria in particular to prioritise their welfare more than ever before.
“As actuality reporters, we cannot pretend that all is well with our members. They are not immune from pathogen exposure, long working hours, psychological distress, fatigue, occupational burnout, stigma, physical, emotional and psychological violence and cannot be left to their devices.
“Our employers owe us a duty at this time to empower us to work efficiently and effectively because it is only under this milieu that their maximum productivity is guaranteed.
“While we appreciate the role of the World Health Organisation(WHO), global experts, governments, private sector employers and development partners to rapidly expand scientific knowledge on this new virus and to provide timely advice on measures to protect people’s health and prevent the spread of this outbreak, we appeal to employers of our members in Nigeria and Africa to up their games on our members’ welfare which, at best is currently despicable and, at worse, non-existent at all in some cases.
“We cannot afford to play the ostrich at this time as COVID-19 has virtually met two of the three factors for a pandemic -rapid sickness and death and sustained person-to-person transmission and analysts saying the third criterion-worldwide spread of the virus, seems like just a matter of time.
“There is no gainsaying fact that journalists face a direct threat to their health and lives and this is an opportune time for employers to show serious concern on their plight.
“Journalists are the most important resource wherever they are employed and their employers must, as a matter of priority, provide them with the requisite tools and conducive environment to work in and avail them of appropriate protective gears to keep them safe and secure in the course of work, especially at this period of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“They must also put in place policies that promote the highest level of state of health of mind and body of reporters and reduce to the barest minimum, pressures borne by those who fall sick in the course of active service while putting in place a good retirement regime for those who retire.
“To prevent or halt global spread, several countries have imposed travel bans to and from China and other countries and many events around the world have been cancelled or postponed indefinitely.
“For journalists, this means fewer events to cover. All journalism beats are impacted although in varying degrees.
“From sports, maritime, aviation, religion, capital/money markets, insurance through technology, labour, defence et cetera, their experience is the same and confounding for most reporters.
“It is a known fact media professionals face a direct threat to their health and lives as well and the situation is more dire in many developing countries who lack the resources to test and identify those infected with the virus and put up with the nagging fear that the virus may already be circulating in the local population.
“Our thoughts go out especially for the freelance community, some of whom have to be on the go to meet their basic needs. Infact, these are the worst-hit since they have neither health insurance nor leave benefits and need to be out in the field often which compounds an already bad case of meeting extra expenses such as working with facemasks and sticking to the safer and therefore costlier eating places to grab a quick bite.
“For this category of reporters, preventive measures such as density reduction, social distancing and their likes are neither here nor there because remaining at home equates with literally committing suicide.
“We have gone at length to bring these concerns in the public space and passionately appeal to stakeholders in journalism to be more responsible and responsive to reporters who keep the world informed, educated and entertained on a regular basis.
‘We appeal to governments at all levels to do all within their powers-policy, regulatory and legal, among others, to ensure that journalism and journalists had the best working environments and enjoyed the best working conditions that conduce to increased productivity and a buoyant economy.
“On their part, we advised reporters themselves to understand they are humans and must be guided by rules and regulations that lead to a safer and more secure humanity.
“It might be nice to see productivity maximised while working remotely via telecommuting and engaging in virtual office meetings.
“Instead of running face-to-face interviews, it might be a good idea in the era of COVID-19 to do online interviewing and limit as much as possible, contacts with their interviewees, except where adequate safety and security measures have been certified by relevant professionals.
“Online press coverage needs to be seriously considered to minimise human contact and exposure and enable reporters to carry on even while confined to bed.
“In addition, for reporters to always sanitise their microphones and recording gadgets with respect to broadcast journalists whereas maintaining the prescribed one (1) meter distance with others”.
Airtel Money Africa, Airtel Africa’s mobile money arm, announced an extended partnership with Africa’s largest mobile money payment service provider (PSP) pawaPay to enable seamless cross-border payments for licensed International Money Transfer Operators (IMTOs) across seven key Airtel Africa markets.
This collaboration officially launches pawaPay’s service for inbound remittances into Uganda, Rwanda, Zambia, Malawi, Gabon, Congo Brazzaville, and Tanzania. The partnership allows IMTOs to efficiently deliver funds globally directly to recipients’ more than 161 million Airtel Money customers wallets, leveraging pawaPay’s renowned reliability, scalability, and 99.9% platform uptime.
Building on five years of trusted collaboration in domestic mobile money, this expansion strengthens and simplifies Airtel Money Africa’s backend processes, using pawaPay’s robust payment service provider infrastructure, which processes over four million transactions daily.
Airtel Money Africa CEO, Ian Ferrao, said: “We’re pleased to expand our partnership with pawaPay to advance international remittances across Africa. Their proven reliability and commitment to African consumers make them an ideal partner. This integration empowers International Money Transfer Operators to securely connect with Airtel Money’s growing footprint, delivering real-time payments that support financial inclusion and economic growth.”
pawaPay CEO, Nikolai Barnwell, said: “Our mission is to simplify payments for businesses in Africa, and remittances are pivotal. Deepening our relationship with Airtel Money allows International Money Transfer Operators to leverage our world-class infrastructure for seamless cross-border payments.”
Remittances remain critical for millions of Africans, enabling family support, entrepreneurship, and financial inclusion. This partnership ensures secure, instant mobile wallet transactions, key to advancing Africa’s digital economy. pawaPay will extend this capability to additional Airtel Money Africa markets in coming months.
Rubrik, the cybersecurity company, and Sophos, a global leader of innovative security solutions for defeating cyberattacks, have announced a strategic partnership to provide Sophos M365 Backup and Recovery Powered by Rubrik.
This marks the first Managed Detection and Response (MDR)-optimized Microsoft 365 backup and recovery solution fully integrated into Sophos Central, Sophos’ security operations platform.
Designed to support IT and cybersecurity teams, the new offering will provide a unified global platform to enhance cyber resilience against ransomware, account compromise, insider threats, and data loss in SharePoint, Exchange, OneDrive, and Teams.
“We are reshaping what it means to stay operational in a world shaped by constant digital disruption,” said Joe Levy, CEO, Sophos. “This is the future of cyber resilience: an intelligent, adaptive partnership that ensures organizations remain secure, responsive, and uninterrupted. By combining Sophos’ prevention-first approach with Rubrik’s unwavering recovery capabilities, we empower businesses to withstand attacks and maintain continuity, even under pressure.”
Sophos will offer a powerful new add-on solution for its more than 75,000 MDR and XDR customers, enabling fast, secure recovery of critical Microsoft 365 data in the event of accidental deletion or malicious compromise.
This solution integrates Rubrik’s industry-leading SaaS-based protection directly into the trusted Sophos Central platform, giving organizations the flexibility to enhance their existing security operations with robust data recovery capabilities.
The Sophos Central platform integrates over 350 different telemetry sources across endpoint, cloud, network, identity, email and business applications. The platform leverages deep learning, custom LLMs, and frontier models to detect and respond to threats across the entire attack surface, enhancing defense effectiveness.
“The reality of today’s threat landscape demands a holistic approach to cyber resilience,” said Bipul Sinha, CEO, Chairman, and Co-founder of Rubrik. “With AI-enabled attacks and sophisticated breaches on the rise, organizations need more than just prevention; they need the ability to recover rapidly and reliably. Our partnership with Sophos delivers this critical capability directly within a platform security teams already use and trust, raising the bar for Microsoft 365 resilience.”
The Evolving Threat Landscape
According to The State of Ransomware report by Sophos, nearly half of organizations impacted by ransomware chose to pay the ransom to recover their data. Despite this, only 54% of affected companies relied on backups for data restoration, highlighting a continued gap in effective cyber resilience practices.
Recent research highlights the urgent need for robust Microsoft 365 data protection: 60% of Microsoft 365 tenants have experienced account takeovers, a frequent launchpad for lateral movement within an organization, and 81% have encountered email compromise.
When global admin credentials are compromised, attackers can manipulate retention settings and permanently delete critical business data.
Existing tools were not designed for comprehensive, large-scale recovery, which requires speed, granularity, and reliability for rapid restoration.
Sophos MDR and XDR customers will benefit from:
- Secure, immutable backups: Rubrik will isolate Microsoft 365 backups with air-gapped storage, WORM locks, and customer-held encryption keys. Multifactor authentication and data lock prevent tampering, even with compromised credentials.
- Fast, flexible recovery: Customers will be able to restore Microsoft 365 emails, OneDrives, SharePoint sites, Teams channels, and more to original or alternate users, including inactive accounts.
- Automated protection: Rubrik will automatically discover Microsoft 365 users, sites, and mailboxes, applies Entra ID-based policies, and supports delegated admin – all integrated with Sophos Central to reduce manual effort.
- Unified experience: Microsoft 365 protection and security operations will be managed via Sophos Central with no extra tools.
Rubrik and Sophos’ shared commitment to helping organizations operate with confidence in the face of risk, will provide Sophos customers and partners with a powerful solution to recover with speed and precision when threats inevitably break through.
This offering will be available through Sophos’ channel partner network in the coming months.
MTN Nigeria is deepening its role as an industry enabler with the launch of its Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) platform and the signing of its first Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) agreement, Chief Financial Officer Modupe Kadri revealed on Monday.
Speaking in an exclusive Channels TV interview, Kadri confirmed that MTN has opened its network to T2 (formerly 9Mobile) under the NaaS framework approved by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC). This allows T2 subscribers to roam seamlessly on MTN’s infrastructure while retaining their own customer relationships and branding.
“Network-as-a-Service is a platform where MNOs can roam within the NCC framework on MTN’s network,” Kadri explained. “It makes the industry more efficient in the utilisation of scarce resources.”
Kadri also announced MTN’s first MVNO partnership, with the virtual operator set to go live soon. MVNOs lease network capacity from established mobile operators, enabling them to offer services without investing in costly infrastructure.
These initiatives align with NCC’s push for infrastructure sharing to boost sector efficiency and coverage. By providing network access to smaller players, MTN is positioning itself as a critical enabler of market expansion.
The Nigerian telecom industry, valued at $10.8 billion, now reaches 169 million active phone lines and over 142 million internet subscribers. While competition remains intense, the trend toward infrastructure sharing is expected to lower barriers to entry for new service providers, increase service quality, and expand access in underserved areas.
“As MTN, we are here to help the industry survive,” Kadri said. “It makes it much easier when you see other operators willing to come on and provide quality services to Nigerians, which we all deserve.”
Industry analysts view the move as a strategic diversification for MTN. With voice revenues plateauing and data driving growth, shared network models offer new revenue streams and a hedge against market saturation.
MTN’s investments in NaaS and MVNO partnerships are part of its broader transformation strategy, which also includes cost optimisation, forex risk reduction, and targeted capital expenditure to strengthen network quality.
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