International Journal of Sub-Saharan African Research (IJSSAR)

Background: Sycophancy in political reporting has become one of the major ethical issues in recent times.
Objective: This study investigated the ethical implications of sycophancy in political reporting among journalists in Owerri Metropolis. The study was underpinned on the social responsibility theory.
Method: The descriptive survey was used as the research design. The population of the study was 219 registered and practicing journalists in Imo State, Nigeria. Meanwhile, the census principle was adopted to study all the journalists in Imo State, Nigeria. Questionnaire was used as the instrument for data collection and it was face validated by an expert. Cronbach Alpha was used to obtained a reliability result of .71 showing the instrument is reliable. Descriptive statistics was use to present and analysed the data. Results: Results showed that to a large extent sycophancy in political reporting has affected the ethics guiding journalists in reporting. Also, the practice of sycophancy portends great danger to the practice of journalism because it goes contrary to the ethical codes of journalism.
Conclusion: We concluded that, not abiding by the ethics of the journalistic profession as a result of sycophancy portends great danger not only to the profession but also to society. Unique contribution: This study has been able to unravel the causes and danger of sycophancy in political reporting particularly in Imo State and by extension Nigeria.
Key Recommendation: The Nigeria Union of Journalists should raise the consciousness of journalists about the dangers of engaging in sycophancy as well as set up a sanction mechanism to curb the practice of sycophancy.