The Director, United Nations Information Centre (UNIC), Nigeria, Ronald Kayanja, has identified independent, pluralistic and free media as vital to achieving information integrity.

Speaking at UNIC Media Partners meeting showcasing the UN key priorities for 2025, Kayanja said independent media is one of the five United Nations Global Principles for Information Integrity. Others are societal trust and resilience, healthy incentives, public empowerment, transparency and research.

To him, misinformation, disinformation and hate speech have been worsened by digital media, so, the UN issued the Global Principles for Information Integrity, which presents a vision of a future in which power imbalances are redressed so that a small group of actors — including technology companies based in a handful of countries — no longer monopolise control over global information flows.

The principles envision an information ecosystem that delivers choice, freedom, privacy and safety for all, in which people everywhere can express themselves freely and make informed and independent decisions.

They put forward proposals to empower people all over the world by handing them greater control over the media they choose to consume, their own online experiences, and how their personal data is used.

The principles offer support to all those working to share facts in the public interest, as well as the vulnerable or marginalised voices that so often bear the brunt of targeted disinformation and hate campaigns.

Calls to action ranged from the legal obligations of states to the responsibilities of the tech sector to best practices for media and civil society.

With regards to free media, Kayanja said information integrity is only achievable with an independent, free and pluralistic media. Robust and urgent responses are needed to support public interest journalism around the world.

Concerning societal trust and resilience, he described these as key components of information integrity. Trust refers to the confidence people have in the reliability and accuracy of the information they access, and resilience to the ability of societies to handle disruption or manipulation of the information ecosystem.

In the area of healthy incentives, he stated advertisers and tech companies could adopt business models that simultaneously uphold human rights and strengthen information integrity and make good business sense.

As regards public empowerment, he observed shifts in tech company policies and increased media literacy can empower users with greater control over their online experience and the use of their own data.

In conclusion, he stated greater transparency and data access is vital to improve understanding of information environments worldwide and provide evidence-based solutions to promote information integrity.

On her part, Senior Human Rights Adviser, Nigeria, Adwoa Kufuor, described journalists as human rights and frontline defenders in strengthening civic education.

She added, in 2025, “we are looking at action plan against hate speech. We see a lot of increase during elections, but we are not waiting for 2027 elections. Work is already ongoing. We are also looking at human rights in the private sector. We are placing emphasis on women and political space. The work around strengthening human rights and protection systems and ensuring access to justice are done as joint one UN in Nigeria.”

Speaking further, she noted, “we are supporting government in terms of institution building. We are building capacity for the police. We are doing these with UN bodies. We are also looking at children’s rights. We need to address the root of any of the issues we are facing. Our engagement with civil societies is key in the area of human rights. At UN, we are not able to cover the country in terms of monitoring, so we rely on civil societies. We ensure there is open space for civil societies to be able to engage on issues that are critical to Nigerians.”

During the questions and answer sessions, National Information Officer, UNIC, Oluseyi Soremekun noted, concerning safety of journalists, “we are in discussion with the National Human Rights Commission to have series of interventions especially to promote safety of journalists.

The UN Human Rights, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), UNIC have a lot of plans. We are not doing this in isolation. Our colleagues in UNESCO have done a lot in this area. We are also deepening discussions on advocacy.”

Peace and Development Advisor Office of the Resident Coordinator, Kimairis Toogood, disclosed there are lot of opportunities for strengthening institutions and actors.

She added there is strong commitment of the state, both formal and informal actors to create policy and enabling environment for peace building

Toogood also stated office for Strategic Preparedness and Resilience have been doing a lot in thought leadership, rolling out capacity building and creating enabling environment, concerning early warning and response.