Radio Silence

 As part of the first African Media Leaders' Forum this week, Eric Chinje, Manager, Africa Region External Affairs of the World Bank, spoke in Dakar on African media development from the donor's perspective.

In his speech, Mr Chinje outlined many of the reasons for optimism-- rising health and education indicators, increased trade and the proliferation of mobile phones that have allowed e-commerce to blossom-- but also some of the challenges facing the continent--namely, that Sub-Saharan Africa remains the only continent not slated to achieve the global development compact included in the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs):

It is against this backdrop – a glass half-full and a glass half-empty– that we must begin to look anew at the African media agenda.  And perhaps, it will help to take a look back, draw some lessons, and then look forward.

The 1960s and 1970s were a time when many African nations were gaining independence.  William Hachten, a prescient observer, noted that "Journalism in free Africa was ready to take off.  Instead, in many cases, it crashed and burned."

In identifying the malaise, he wrote that the newly independent one-party governments were hostile to newspapers they could not control. Even small African papers that led the fight against colonialism became enemies of the new class that ruled Africa. Politicians who controlled the destinies of fragile new states began to persecute African journalists, a process that "created dull, obeisant and uninformative newspapers."

Unsurprisingly, the number of papers shrank; there were fewer daily newspapers in Africa during the early 1980's than during the 1960's.  According to his data, in 1980 there were only 124 daily newspapers on the continent.  Of these, South Africa, Nigeria, and Morocco accounted for almost half the total among 38 nations.

That's great context for understanding the current media landscape and recognizing how that past shapes the present.

The next step of course is to then assess the current setting in which the media operates, which Mr. Chinje does:

Fast forward to the 1990s, a period marked by the liberalization of political space and   growing "hunger" for information and new ideas.  Private entrepreneurs – many of you in this room – overcame the odds of low investments, inadequate capacity, poor policy environments, ill-defined libel laws, and oppressive regulations to create vibrant media industries

The shadow of these shortcomings continues to this day.

Mr. Chinje goes on to illustrate the importance of a free media by saying that no country with a free media has experienced widespread famine because such a condition could not persist in an environment where media scrutiny would instigate human action.