Sorry, We Media Types Think You're Idiots... By CHARLES ONYANGO-OBBO There was a lot about the dangers that journalists and press freedom face during the World Press Freedom day last week. Corrupt governments, rogue militaries, drug barons and other international criminal networks, religious fundamentals, everyone is out to get the media.
There was, however, very little about how the media are their own worst enemies. East African journalism is about mature enough to criticise itself, so let us do it. With two or three exceptions, reading the press in East Africa today -- as indeed in most of Africa; listening to independent FM stations and the few private TV stations, one begins to doubt whether we journalists give a damn about press freedom either. Many journalists and media managers seem to have made the assumption that serious journalism doesn�t sell. That the only way the media can make money is through attracting younger people, and women. No problem. The beef is with their conviction that young people and women are idiots who are only interested in light fluff, fashion, and stories of pop stars and photos of celebrities with bare breasts adorned with rings. The result is that most FM stations are more likely to hire a popular clown over a talented investigative journalist, and pay the joker three times more. A story about wetlands, Treasury-bill rates, and the bureaucracy at the ports in Mombasa or Dar es Salaam is difficult to sell, sure. But that doesn�t mean it can�t be done. Mort Rosenblum, in his wonderful book Coups and Earthquakes, tells of the fluctuation of the price of tin in Malaysia many years ago. For weeks, the American papers ignored the story, until one day when the price of tin shot through the roof, an enterprising reporter wrote about how women would soon be paying many more dollars to buy cooking pots. And all of a sudden, a story that had been ignored was making it to the front pages. Young people and Generation X can read a story about Treasury-bill rates if it is written in a way that captures their imagination. And women too will read about politics if it�s reported without the crass masculinity and conflict-laden hysteria with which it tends to be presented. We have become cowardly, lost the stomach for innovation, and allowed the "market" to lead us by the nose. At one point, journalists felt challenged to get the market to follow what they considered the important issues of the day, and they succeeded. Not any more. The result is that, in the past 10 years, newspapers have introduced many new pullouts on sports, entertainment, and lifestyle, but virtually none built around strong public-affairs reporting. Papers that had sections that attempted to treat the important political and social issues of the day in some depth have watered them down or scrapped them all together. It�s so scandalous that across the breadth of Africa, it�s only Carte Blanche, on the South African pay channel DSTv, that consistently does any investigative and current affairs reporting. Having been in a position of editorial leadership, I feel a sense of shame and failure for not having fought the bastardisation of the media more than I did. And, of course, even when we try, we are still plagued by sloppiness and inaccuracies and, sometimes, blatant bias in our reporting. We are now reaping the fruits of our folly. If tomorrow East Africa woke up and there wasn�t a single newspaper on the streets, and the radios and TV stations were off the air, there would be some unease, certainly. But by lunchtime life would be going on normally for everyone else, except journalists and media managers who would be worrying about where their next pay cheque was coming from. Unless the media work themselves back into a position where they can be missed; where they do actually take up a public issue and make a difference for the communities they serve; the politicians and criminal gangs will always kick us down and get away with it. Charles Onyango-Obbo is managing editor in charge of media convergence at the Nation Media Group. E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Bwanika ________ http://www.idr.co.ug http://p201.ezboard.com/fugandamanufacturersassociationfrm1 ----------------------------------------------------------- Spela poker mot verkliga m�nniskor �ver Internet. �ver 40 000 spelare online http://www.multipoker.com -------------------------------------------- This service is hosted on the Infocom network http://www.infocom.co.ug
