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SADC
Journalists Under Fire
The launch of the SADC Journalists Under
Fire campaign on May 3 2003, saw MISA's media freedom monitoring
programme take on a holistic approach, i.e. the programme activities
went
beyond the mere issuing of a media freedom or freedom of
expression alert to put in place required strategies for advocacy,
lobbying,
research, training
information and, most importantly, mechanism for
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direct and immediate practical support to victims of media freedom
violations.
The launch of this campaign went hand-in-hand with a research study
that MISA undertook of its alerts over a three-year period, from
2000 to 2002. The study revealed among many the following regional
trends over this period:
• The increased arrests of journalists
• Restricting the freedom of movement of journalists (the expulsion of
foreign correspondents and the physical obstruction of indigenous journalists
from covering news events in their own countries, even press conferences, and
including their forced removal from some outlying districts and provinces of
their countries)
Between 1994 and 2003 MISA has recorded 1 521 individual violations against
media practitioners and institutions in the SADC region.
Although Zimbabwe had topped the list as the most repressive country
in the SADC region since 2000 in terms of media freedom violations, the
research revealed that there is no reason for complacency in any of the
other countries of the region. In fact, the study confirmed that the
same trends of media freedom violations that occur in Zimbabwe, also
occur in many other countries of the SADC region, but not to the same
extent.
MISA's monitoring of the SADC media environment further revealed the
emergence of new themes of professional importance to journalists and
to the organisation. These include the increase of civil defamation cases
against the media and concerns about the high financial penalties being
awarded to successful litigants.
The emergence of more independent media councils (voluntary media complaints
bodies) or attempts to do so, the establishment of national editors forums,
increasing concerns about the wages and working conditions of journalists,
the struggle for the appointment of statutory but independent broadcasting
authorities. Developments around the introduction of Access to Information
legislation, gender reportage and coverage, and the rise of media civil
society coalitions (including associations of journalists in the state
owned media) for media freedom advocacy and legal reform purposes. All
of these issues have a direct bearing on media freedom and the quality
of journalism in the SADC region. Further info research@misa.org
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