BBC World Service has made a major move to reach more people by launching the Pidgin section for digital platforms for the West African region. The launching is expected to reach more Africans since the majority of the population is not fluent in the English Language.
🙌🏿 "We don land gidigba!' (We've finally arrived!)🎉
Meet the team behind BBC Pidgin, launching tomorrowhttps://t.co/iHdOBqGoOD for more pic.twitter.com/TAzMmcV8nq— BBC News Africa (@BBCAfrica) August 20, 2017
The pidgin language is no one’s mother tongue but is seen as a uniting language. In fact, it has become the native tongue of most people in places like Warri, Sapele, Port-Harcourt and Benin City. It is spoken by well over 3 million people as their native tongue and it primarily serves the need of effective communication in a place with a multiplicity of languages. Nigeria is definitively the definition of such a place, having a numerous number of languages, and innumerable dialects.
Mind you, Pidgin has both the Francophone and Anglophone variants, hence this development will help strike a balance between people of different languages in Africa. According to BBC, this addition, like Google’s, will be followed by some African and Asian languages.
@yawazobiafm x @EfeMoney x @realchechesmith x the Alapomeji @Iamancestor ontop #MakeUnaWakeUp show pic.twitter.com/tyTWBpWHyn
— #ChookMouth Wazobia FM 95.1 (@Wazobia_FM) June 21, 2017
The major Pidgin Broadcasting in Nigeria started in 2007 for listeners mainly by Wazobia FM, after which a few television stations took it to a new level of viewing. This addition by BBC will be the first Pidgin broadcasting done by text and on a digitised platform and is a highly necessary development which will effectively enhance better communication, cutting across barriers.
This development will make BBC Africa a level playing field for both the fluent English speakers and the Pidgin speakers but the success of such a venture has to be proven, given that the Pidgin language has its own dialects which depend on the local language of the area and BBC would need to employ fluent speakers of the language, as a visitor to the website observed.
This move will no doubt make the news more interesting for many. Talk about the world getting more knitted.
