ALL countries around the world launch various media campaigns dealing with different issues. I am not talking about drug or traffic campaigns; I mean the ones bolstering our patriotism and belonging to this nation. We have campaigns focusing on the sense of belonging but they have not been that successful, perhaps because they were not implemented properly. In terms of preparation and design, they were almost perfect. The problem lies when the time of implementation comes. I believe some people who supervise these campaigns still do not understand the changes our society has seen and continues to see and still insist on implementing these campaigns in the same old tried and traditional ways. They never take the social media websites into consideration and do not view them as effective tools to reach out to the larger section of society, and by that I mean our young men and women. The social media play an important role in our society and this is a fact that should not and cannot be overlooked. Unfortunately, our official media has not risen to our expectations. I am referring to the television channels and the radio stations. Perhaps the largest campaign that is going on now is the one combating terrorism. If we look closely how our TV channels and radio stations are covering the campaign, we will be surprised to note that their coverage is modest. An effective campaign is not the one that focuses on holding interviews with experts and showing videos of national and patriotic songs. It is the one that provides us with live and direct coverage from the scene. It is the one that lifts the morale of citizens. All associations, organizations, and institutions organizing national campaigns should discuss the agenda and plan of their campaigns with the state media so that the objectives of the campaign be the same. We need to learn from the experiences of state medias in other countries and follow suit. Our campaigns should be more focused in order to achieve the sought-after goals.
