Media Flaws

Happy Africa Day! Even though I wonder what’s to be happy about it as I see no value in celebrating Africa Day when actual Africans have nothing to celebrate.

Not even unity.

There is no glue that holds Africans together instead we have a media that is perceived to be tearing it apart. We have a media that speaks an absolutely different language to the language spoken by the African. The heterogeneity of an African audience is something we have yet to come to grips with. When we speak of press freedom some would invoke the opposite – freedom from the press. We need a press that understands the context in which it operates. Sadly ours is a media that makes no effort to Africanise its narrative and news values and complexities.

For example: The prevalence of the Royal Wedding which occupied all our media, yet African royalty is treated with contempt, disdain and generally of a lesser currency than the set criteria of Western royalty.

Besides not paying homage to Africa respectfully, many African leaders view the media as somewhat of a younger sibling dying to tell “mommy” [read: public] what s/he did wrong. It annoys them. But make no mistake this is not an annoyance unique to leaders only, it is trickling down to the masses who are slowly resisting the media as its identity as a self-regulating, or what we call uzwilakhe, is fast-becoming apparent. To dismiss claims, leaders need only say “You know the media!” and everyone knows what they mean. The media has become this unilateral body that stands in isolation to the majorities of Africa.

I am not saying the media must stand down from exposing corruption, laziness, government incompetence and all other associates of what constituted the description of Africans by colonists. Yet, it seems the media still speaks to this stereotype. What I am saying is that Africa’s media should be aligning itself closer to the values of Africans (in terms of proximity and relevance).

Now by African I do no infer race, but rather location. At present we have a situation where the media are dominant presenters of language (Bill, 1991) and set national discourse – more than the number of discussions one has in a day. Yet, this dominating voice has no resonance with the majority. So who is Africa’s media speaking to? With what objectives in mind? Some would argue it speaks to a minority with media buying power, to affirm their worst fears. Some would say we have indigenous language media as forms of ‘divided illocution’ (Fill, 1986), which means all are served. How are they served though? And what are they served?

I ask this because the thing is news or media as we know it have evolved, but the last ones to realise this will be its producers. If we take a closer look at present-day news, they in actual fact focus less on what they are reporting. e.g. Open toilets. How many open toilets and people sitting on open toilets did you actually see during the flush of open toilet reports? Close to none. Instead reports on open toilets swirled around politicians; paraphrasing their statements, quoting them, yet telling us nothing about the actual open toilets, except that they exist. The proverbial shitstorm was shifted to accountability instead of reportage.

If anything the media have become ideological interventions that have hijacked their watchdog statuses in Africa. I fail to see how Africans in their struggles for power never covered means of holding their own leaders accountable. In days bygone leaders were held to account to by their communities. These days they are held to account by the media. The standard African question is: Who appointed this media? People do not elect themselves in African practise so what we are seeing is an Africa facing self-appointed public protectors.

To the minds of many leaders this is inconceivable. They fought, died or suffered only to have oPRESSive minions rain on their parade. That is how South Africa’s ANC is increasingly viewing the media. That is how African leaders like Mugabe view the media, etcetera. Hence the Anton Hammerls will get shot in numbers as this African intolerance of the unknown prevails. Hence things like the Protection of Information Bill will be passed into law and Media Tribunals will happen. Some might use Nigeria as a counter example (yesterday they passed their freedom of information bill, which I must add hasn't been signed by the current president. The former president, Olusegun Obasanjo, refused to sign such a bill into law in 2007. Think about the "why?"  Because there is an increasing resistance towards this unknown, yet bold, perceived-to-be-self-determining entity. So let's not get ahead of ourselves until President Goodluck Jonathan signs Nigeria's free press bill).

Signed or not signed, I am always amazed at how media players in Africa strut around oblivious to the fact that they are misunderstood. A sense of we-are-entitled-to-be-here, a sense of we-serve-the-public-interest, even though it's known they serve small interest groups. An African thing to do would be to sit down with African leaders establish your roles in their societies, ensure that your methods and objectives are understood, reach an agreement on measures like how to hold one another accountable. Understand their complexities - where they're coming from, what informs their decisions and how these dynamics pan out with their communities. To just report what you see, would be to scratch the surface. Work with them. Saying you will hold yourself accountable to yourself is nonsense for either party.

It’s important to note that I do not agree with much of what I have written here, but I am trying to come to terms with how Africa can be freed from the press and how the press can be free. The media is simply not speaking in the language of Africa. And by this I do not mean they must submit themselves to government and be lapdogs. I am saying the roles, now more than ever need to be cleared up. Otherwise we run the risk of “Aw dubul’ iMedia! Dubula! Dubula! [pause] Aw dubul’ iMedia...” being dubbed a struggle song in the near future.