For coming this far, Media Trust Limited, publishers of the Trust titles, will be organising its 20th anniversary to reflect and plan for the future, Chairman/Founder of the company, Malam Kabiru Yusuf, has revealed.
Yusuf also announced plans by the company to get listed on the Stock Exchange for members of the public to own shares, even as he said its future lies in digital technology.
Similarly, the media owner said the 20-year-old company now has a head office in Abuja, and publishes simultaneously from its own facilities in Abuja, Lagos, Kano and Maiduguri, with Sokoto coming on board soon.
He made the disclosures at a press conference in Abuja ahead of the company’s 20th anniversary holding next week.
According to him, Weekly Trust was started because “we wanted a job.
And we tried to create one.
And we are 20 years old.
” Tracing the genesis of the Trust titles, the media guru said it all started in a single room at Kaduna with the Weekly Trust, which was published only on Fridays.
“The Weekly title started during the military regime of the late Sani Abacha, but we were determined to be our own selves and not to be dictated to,” he said.
“Within months General Abdulsalami Abubakar took over with the promise of returning the country to politics and we then thought of going daily with a political newspaper,” Yusuf said.
While acknowledging the challenges faced by the company over time, he said it had sustainably weathered the storm for 20 years.
He said the Media Trust “had been quite adventurous with new titles.
”
