Impact of COVID-19 lockdown on female television practitioners in selected stations at the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja

Abstract

The paper observes that the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has affected humanity and posed a tremendous challenge. For this reason, the paper aims to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 lockdown on female television practitioners in selected stations in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja. The objectives are to study the work experiences of female television practitioners, the impact of the lockdown, and the pattern of prevalence of the effects of COVID lockdowns on female television practitioners in the selected television stations in the FCT. The researcher employed the mixed-survey research method, comprising the quantitative and qualitative methods. This was most appropriate as it involved the researcher seeking the respondents' opinions on enquiries based on the research objectives. Fifty-one (51) female staff were selected as a sample from the population using simple random sampling at the Abuja stations of the Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) and the African Independent Authority (AIT). Thirty-four (34) were from NTA, and seventeen (17) were from AIT, constituting the study sample. Two senior female practitioners were interviewed to generate responses that complemented those obtained through the questionnaire. Percentages were used to analyse the biodata of the respondents, while mean scores of the 5-scale Likert table were used to weigh the responses to the three research questions. The data collated indicated that the female staff were at their duty posts as essential staff throughout the COVID-19 lockdown. They were significantly negatively affected socially, psychologically, economically and health-wise both at work and at home. Anchored on the Agenda - Setting and Framing theories, the study recommends, among other things, that the government and the media houses should provide adequate workplace medical and psychosocial care to female media practitioners to deal with the fear of contacting COVID-19 as well as cope with the stresses associated with work and family demands of the lockdown.