(TriceEdneyWire.com) – A recent NAACP “Black Media Speaks” forum plummeted into a conversation in which the future of hard-copy, black-owned newspapers was all but pronounced dead.

To the shock of some of the members of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), A federation of more than 200 black-owned newspapers, there was not one black newspaper journalist or publisher on the panel.

“In 2020, for there to be a virtual panel on Black Media and not invite or involve the NNPA or any of our member publishers to be on the panel goes beyond a mere oversight,” said NNPA President/CEO Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis in an interview about the May 20 forum.

Hosted by NAACP President/CEO Derrick Johnson and moderated by journalist Ed Gordon of Ed Gordon Media, formerly of BET, the forum had been widely promoted by the NAACP as a discussion on the need for Black media during the coronavirus pandemic and continued physical attacks on black people by police and others.

Blankson did not explain how or why members of NNPA or other reporters for black newspapers were not invited to the “Black Media Speaks” panel.