The United State Government has voted a total of $960 million towards setting up a 24-hour satellite television channel in northern Nigeria, in a bid to curtail the terror acts of Boko Haram.
Work on the new TV station which will be named Arewa24 started in 2013, the New York Times reports.
The television project is financed by the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Counterterrorism.
The paper also noted that the initiative is being run by Equal Access International, a San Francisco-based government contractor that has managed similar media programs sponsored by the State Department in Yemen and Pakistan.
Work on the project is nearing completion, but broadcasts have not yet begun, the report said, quoting U.S. officials informed about the plan.
In addition to the broadcasts, the project would provide training to journalists in the region, including women, who would then be able to produce their own video content, the Times said.