SADC JOURNALISTS SHARPEN ELECTION REPORTING SKILLS

by Pamela Chinaka

As southern Africa braces for elections in Botswana, Mozambique and Namibia, journalists have been called upon to analyse critically manifestoes of political parties, put them into context and highlight issues that are not implementable so as to help the electorate make informed choices when they vote.

The call was made by the Vice Chancellor of the University of Namibia, Professor Peter Katjavivi when he addressed over thirty journalists from the SADC region who attended a regional workshop on reporting elections in southern Africa, in Windhoek recently.

He warned journalists to guard against being used to advance agendas set by political parties and other organisations, saying the media played a crucial role in any democracy and should therefore write fair and balanced reports.

"As journalists, you should strive to help voters understand issues clearly and get them above petty politicking issues," he said.

Addressing the same workshop, the executive director of the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA), Jeanette Minnie, called on journalists working for both the state and private media to unite in their fight for favourable media laws in their respective countries. She said: "media rights and responsibilities are two sides of the same coin and the same set of rules should apply to all journalists regardless of whether they are working for the state or private-owned media".

The former Director of Namibia Electoral Commission, Professor Gerhard Totemeyer stressed the need for electoral bodies to strictly adhere to the principles of fairness, equality, impartiality and accountability during the course of their duties.

He said, "the integrity, incorruptibility and trustworthiness of electoral bodies, should never be doubted", adding that elections were a crucial element of democracy, and election bodies entrusted with the execution of elections were vital in making democracy work.

In his address, the Chairman of the SADC Parliamentary Forum, Dr. Mose Tjitendero underlined the importance of appropriate electoral systems for any given country saying, electoral systems contribute directly to the improved cooperation and co-existence of varying political perspectives.

"I believe this is one of the primary factors contributing to the prevalence of Proportional Representation system in southern Africa...there exists a real need to provide an electoral system that will ensure representation of all people along the socio-political spectrum. A constituency based system would certainly not achieve this ideal," he said.

Participants to the workshop co-hosted by the Southern African Research and Documentation Centre (SARDC) and the University of Namibia's department of Information and Communication Studies, had the opportunity to discuss a draft media handbook on reporting elections in southern Africa compiled by the two organisations. They made recommendations on how to improve the book and also shared their experiences in covering elections.

As a tribute to the late Chola Bright Mwape of MISA, who died in a car accident a few days before the workshop, the handbook will be dedicated to his memory. Mwape, a well-respected journalist in the region, was supposed to have delivered a key- note address to the workshop.

The head of SARDC's Sustainable Democracy and Governance Programme, Kondwani Chirambo introduced to participants, the organisation's Cross-border Election Media Coverage project, which is aimed at strengthening media coverage of elections across borders. Through the project which is funded by USAID, a number of journalists from the region have been sponsored to cover elections in Malawi and South Africa, with preparations for covering elections in Botswana, Mozambique and Namibia already in progress.

"The purpose of this is to broaden regional exposure and perspectives of key journalists and existing media outlets, while providing stronger access within the SADC region to information on national development issues in a regional context," Chirambo told the participants.

The SARDC office in Maputo is also running a similar project although at a national level. "The project is aimed at facilitating journalists from within Mozambique to cover elections around the country's provinces," Antonio Gumende, the Executive Editor of the Maputo office, said at the workshop.

Journalists at the workshop hailed the projects as very beneficial to the media fraternity in the region, which in most cases cannot afford to assign its staff to cover foreign elections due to financial constraints. They hoped they would be able to get sponsorship to cover the forthcoming elections in the region.

Other issues raised during the workshop included the need to have elections reporting as part of the curriculum in media studies. "Training institutions in the SADC region have not done enough in equipping journalists with the requisite skills for the task... and it is high time that the needs of the journalist in electoral coverage were fully met," said Edward Chitsulo, the Head of Media studies department at the Malawi Polytechnic.

Representatives of media training institutions also expressed the need for collaboration amongst training institutions as a way forward in strengthening media training in the region. (SARDC)