Beyond Advertorials: Building a Sustainable Business Model for Nigerian Journalism
The Business of Truth: A New Compact
By Mohammed Manga
In the old caravan routes that linked Kano to Timbuktu, the merchants had a rule the young ones learned early. They said: “Do not pay the singer to praise your goods; pay the weigher to weigh them truly.” For a praised bag may sell once, but a truly weighed bag brings the customer back for life.
The elder merchants knew why. In a market where every stall shouts, the ear gets tired. But the hand that weighs honestly — that hand becomes the market itself. People may forget the song, but they never forget the scale that did not cheat them.
As elders along the Katsina-Borno corridor teach: “When the lamp has no oil, even the honest watchman cannot see the thief.” And they add: “A drum that is beaten for sale loses its voice when truth comes to dance.”
Every society has known that watchman. He is not the richest, nor the loudest, but he is the one trusted to say when night has fallen and when water is coming. His voice carries not because he owns the town, but because the town owns his trust.
That old caravan rule — do not pay the singer, pay the weigher — still asks us today: How do we keep oil in the lamp without buying the watchman’s voice? Today we call that watchman journalism. Not because journalism is the only watchman, but because in a noisy market, it is the one institution whose work is to weigh, not sing. How a society pays the weigher without asking him to sing its praises — that is the business of truth.
The world has answered it, not with slogans, but with systems deliberately designed to separate funding from control.
In Britain, for example, every household contributes £159.50 yearly as licence fee. That decision, published in BBC Annual Report 2023/24, raised over £3.8 billion without a single advert on domestic channels. Its Royal Charter is clear: the payer funds, but does not dictate the story.
In Germany, similarly, €18.36 monthly is paid by each household — not as tax to government, but as broadcasting contribution to an independent commission that sustains ARD and ZDF, as listed on Rundfunkbeitrag official portal.
In America, for instance, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting received $535 million federal appropriation in FY2023 to keep NPR and PBS on air in rural counties where commercial radio will not go, per CPB official budget. And the New York Times, once advertisement-dependent, now draws majority revenue from over 10 million paying subscribers as of Q1 2024 earnings — readers, not sponsors, keep its investigative desk alive.
In South Africa, on our own continent, the lesson was born in 2002 — the Media Development and Diversity Agency, MDDA. Government, print and broadcast industry put money in one pot, managed by an independent board, to fund community media that commercial adverts would never reach. Its 2022/23 report shows support to over 500 community projects, with 62 percent in rural areas.
As Nobel Laureate Maria Ressa warned, “When you can’t tell fact from fiction, you can’t tell what is true.”
What unites London, Berlin, New York and Johannesburg is not wealth. It is one invention: a wall between the purse and the pen.
It is only when that global picture is clear that we can turn gently to our own market.
Nigeria’s media market today stands at that same crossroads where praise and weight must be separated — not because praise is bad, but because weight is the foundation. An advertorial announces what an institution wishes you to know — useful information. Journalism helps you know what you need to know to choose — invaluable trust. The first announces, the second verifies. Both have value, but they cannot be weighed on same scale.
Our media space is perhaps the liveliest in Africa — over 100 television stations, over 500 radio stations, over 1,000 print titles, and more than 10,000 online platforms counted by 2023 audits. Yet total measured advertising spend, estimated at N605 billion in 2023 by mediaReach OMD, remains concentrated in Lagos, in few sectors, in few hands. When many mouths drink from one small calabash, the calabash cracks.
A credible newsroom may keep reporters for years, yet struggle to renew its portal — hosting, security, SSL, CMS — costing as modest as N4.5 million yearly — not because it is wasteful, but because revenue is thin. When renewal competes with salary, good analysis waits. As the respected media manager quietly observed — that good articles struggle without advertorials — she was not insulting her profession. She was describing economics. And economics, if not designed, will design us.
From this thin wallet, three rivers now flow in same bed.
The first is citizen journalism — a democratic gain we must celebrate. During COVID-19, citizen videos saved lives faster than press releases. During floods in Borno and Bayelsa, a phone in the market reported water level before any crew arrived. As the Igbo say, “One finger cannot lift a load.”
The second is junk journalism — where anyone with data becomes publisher, where verification is seen as delay, where headline must shout before fact checks, fueling fake news, misinformation and disinformation.
The third is survival journalism — where credible, ethical houses that have invested for years in reporters and editors find they must rent pages to stay open. It is not greed. It is survival. But survival mode blurs the line between announcement and verification in public eye.
Three quiet gaps explain this confluence.
First, entry is open to all. The Nigerian Press Council Act requires a diploma and internship. In practice, enforcement is soft. Unlike law or medicine, you can begin journalism tomorrow morning with a borrowed camera.
Second, verification is expensive. A good fact-check by Dubawa or FactCheckHub takes hours, sometimes days. A rumour takes seconds.
Third, trust is shared on same timeline. Edelman Trust Barometer 2023 placed trust in media in Nigeria at 61 percent, but trust in “my social feed” at 43 percent — credible and incredible now sit on same bench, and the young cannot tell which is elder.
As Walter Lippmann taught, “There can be no higher law in journalism than to tell the truth and shame the devil.”
How then do we move beyond advertorials without demonising them?
We can learn, not copy.
If TETFund can, from a modest education levy, rebuild tertiary education without owning universities, Nigeria can build a Media Sustainability Trust from a modest pooled contribution from paid advertising turnover of large advertisers, plus a small telecom content support window already budgeted under Universal Service Provision, plus voluntary private sector ESG — no new tax on citizen. Managed by an independent board of NUJ, Nigerian Guild of Editors, NPAN, Broadcasting Organisation of Nigeria, civil society, academia, and private sector, where government contributes but does not control. Disbursement tied not to loyalty, but to verifiable editorial investment, rural coverage, fact-check desks and internship for young reporters.
When financial reporting requires certification before byline, why not governance, health and classified reporting? Not to silence citizens, but to layer — Citizen Contributor after short ethics course, and Professional Cadre after diploma and ethics clearance. No one is banned from speaking, but byline on sensitive beats carries responsibility.
Where citizens pay for DSTV and data, they can pay for truth — if truth gives value worth paying for. A reader revenue incentive — where verified newspaper subscription, digital or print, is recognised as business expense credit for SMEs, and where corporate bodies can adopt community newspaper as part of CSR — can seed subscription culture. The New York Times did not get 10 million subscribers by pleading. It gave value that made readers stay.
Since NIN, BVN, TIN and passport linkages have improved continuity, and Corporate Affairs Commission now registers business in 48 hours from weeks before — reforms we celebrate — then labelling on platforms can improve continuity of trust. A simple mark: Verified Newsroom, Community Contribution, Fact-Checked — so reader chooses with eyes open.
And finally, an annual tripartite roundtable — Government, Business, Media — not for patronage, but for transparency: how much was spent on advertorials versus investigative grants, what impact, what learning. As old wisdom teaches, when the stream dries, we study its former path to know where to dig.
What does Nigeria gain if this is done?
First, jobs. Media viability studies show every sustained community newsroom supports 8-12 direct jobs and many indirect. A modest trust can sustain over 2,000 young reporters, fact-checkers and producers yearly.
Second, trust that becomes GDP. Portugal’s Citizen Shops — Loja do Cidadão — operate 57 shops offering over 2,800 services with average waiting 55 minutes and 86 percent satisfaction per Agency for Administrative Modernisation 2023. Rwanda’s Irembo platform offers over 100 e-services to over 6 million users, reducing service time from 4 days to 6 hours per IremboGov 2023 report. Brazil’s Poupatempo has delivered over 190 million services since 1997 with 97 percent approval per São Paulo Government 2023. Trust saves time, and time is productivity.
Third, inclusion. South Africa’s MDDA shows community media can reach rural majority. Our trust can fund radio in Argungu, newspaper in Ikot Ekpene, podcast in Nnewi — bringing national conversation to local language.
Fourth, governance feedback. When court affidavits are traceable, when prepaid meter complaints are resolved in hours, when driver’s licence renewal is predictable, when SME registration is 48 hours, accurate reporting creates feedback loop for policy. As Amartya Sen argued, “Development is freedom, and freedom is only real when institutions deliver.”
This is not indictment. This is invitation. We have seen proof that systems can outlive applause — CAC in 48 hours, visa-on-arrival with biometrics, NIN-BVN harmonisation. The same discipline can secure the newsroom.
For the lesson of the caravan is still true. The merchant who pays only the singer sells once. The merchant who pays the weigher builds a market that lasts generations.
As Joseph Pulitzer taught, “Put it before them briefly so they will read it, clearly so they will appreciate it, picturesquely so they will remember it and, above all, accurately so they will be guided by its light.”
Nigeria has never lacked voice. From town crier to community radio, from newspaper vendor at Wuse to blogger in Yaba, the story has always been told. What it has lacked is a business model that lets honest weighing pay.
If we build it — a trust that funds without owning, a certification that guides without silencing, a reader who pays because value is clear — then the portal that costs N4.5 million will not be a burden. It will be an asset. And the good article that educates thousands will not wait for advertorial. It will stand on its own scale.
That is beyond advertorials. That is the business of truth.
_Mohammed Manga is a public policy analyst and writes on governance and sub-national reforms. Email: [email protected]_
