Tanzania still address security of media workers
By Elias Mhegera – Discussing professional ethics in journalism in Tanzania has always been a major challenge, but no one would have expected that even discussing their own security could cause commotion.
assault and eventual murder of Daud Mwangosi
On Wednesday last week the Media Council of Tanzania convened journalists with the purpose of discussing security concerns for journalists, taking into account the recent attack on the chairman of the Tanzania Editors’ Forum, Absalom Kibanda.
Austerius Banzi, senior officer at the MCT, expounded on the security challenge to journalists, but if one is to assess the meeting at the New Africa Hotel one would conclude that much has to be done on this matter.
Tanzania Editors Forum Chairamn Absalom Kibanda after being attacked by unknown assailants
In two separate incidents similar hot debates had ensued, one was to do with whether it was proper for journalists to accept presidential appointments to posts such as district commissioner or other similar positions.
But this time around the debate was centred on a hot subject, and even at a moment when many Tanzanians have vivid memories of the barbaric attack on the TEF chairman KIbanda, who is still receiving medical treatment in Milpark, a South African hospital.
Stimulating the debate was Ms Valerie Msoka, the executive director of the Tanzania Media Association (TAMWA), who prefaced her words with the title “Who is my real enemy?”
Shout-africa.com witnessed her revisiting her long and well-established career in journalism, she acknowledged that she could easily establish who her enemy was wherever she went, but in the underlying situation in Tanzania she was afraid that she could not easily do that.
President Jakaya Kikwete visiting an attacked editor Saed Kubenea in a Hospital in 2007
“I have worked with media outlets like the BBC, and even with the United Nations I could sense who my immediate enemy as a reporter was, but it is very difficult for one to tell who the enemy of journalists in Tanzania is,” she commented.
Elaborating, she said that in all those countries where the enemies of the people were already identified, automatically they became enemies of the media.
“We as media wanted to defend innocent people and their lives, so we were targeted by the adversaries of the people, but this is not the case here in Tanzania,” she noted.
She added that even in the neighbouring countries of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Burundi to as far as Libya, there was a clear demarcation of who is an enemy and who is not.
“Who is my enemy really? The Field Force Unit, intelligence officers? Is it political parties? I am saying parties because I don’t know which party exactly is sending hooligans to attack journalists, I am startled,” she commented.
reporter with Channel 10 Daud Mwangosi before his death
Msoka recalled the killing of Daud Mwangosi, Issa Ngumba, and attacks against journalists who had visited Mtwara recently, with the motive alleged that they did not report the truth, after the media outlets had portrayed that the oil and gas disturbances were over.
Extending her series of questions, Msoka asked again “Is my enemy the media owner?”; winding up her presentation she said that what comes out is a gloomy picture of terrified journalists, of whom some are scared to go on with this profession, particularly the women.
She cautioned colleagues in her profession to take precautions, but not become scared whenever there was a fatal incident like the death of Mwangosi, which left many female journalists experiencing grief, panic and trauma.
Msoka’s presentation was followed by a visiting lecturer in the communications arena, Prof. Nicholls Boas, US -based Tanzanian.
The don said that according to his experience independently owned media outlets stand a better chance of acting as true agents of change. On the other hand, in many cases government-owned outlets are propaganda tools for the government of the day, and this is more-or-less the trend the world over.
The don charged further that intimidation in so many ways, including attacks, using intelligence officers tailing journalists and even the use of the judiciary, are common practices almost everywhere, with dominant parties whose existence is threatened.
Kibanda attending a meeting
“All these attempts are meant to suppress opposing voices, you have to be courageous and move on, but with great precaution”, he summarized, and paved the way for further discussion.
But Prof. Issa Shivji, professor emeritus from the University of Dar es Salaam and the current chair of the Mwalimu Nyerere Pan Africanist Chair, said you cannot isolate violence against journalists from what is happening in the society at large.
He cited a recent incident of extrajudicial killing, where one policeman shot dead a motorcycle operator (commonly known as boda boda) then himself received back by being stoned to death.
But these comments were not necessarily accepted wholly without reservations. In particular was Prof Boas’ stance that the independent media (privately owned) stand a better chance of being critical and giving the people what they want, as opposed to the government -owned media, which implicitly tends to work as propaganda tools of the government.
One senior editor, who has worked with the Daily News, the government newspaper, for a number of years, was somewhat infuriated and he intervened.
He said that in Tanzania it is almost the opposite, because at least the government can afford to pay a salary to its media workers, while in private media journalists can go up to three months without pay.
This editor was immediately supported by his former colleague Deogratius Mushi, who is still employed by the Tanzania Standard Newspaper, publisher of the Daily News and Habari Leo.
He said the insecurity of journalists is mainly caused by lack of contracts and deserved remuneration, a situation which erodes media ethics to a large extent.
Seeing that the debate was swaying towards his direction, the executive secretary of the Media Owners Association (MOAT), Henry Muhanika, reminded participants that the debate in motion is security of journalists and not their remunerations and other benefits.
But Prof Boas was quick to intervene, and he retorted: “Salaries are part and parcel of the journalists’ safety; with an empty stomach you are not safe already,” and by this tone the debate now became a full session of discussion about media ethics vis a vis poor remunerations to Tanzania journalists, to a large extent diverting from the original motion.
Ms Lillian Timbuka from Uhuru Publishers, owners of the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi propaganda tools Uhuru and Mzalendo, cajoled her colleagues by saying that a good number of stories in the privately-owned ‘independent’ media houses are either concocted, deliberately exaggerated or promotional (P R stories),.
She advanced that these are sources of income to journalists who go without pay from their employers.
As the debate was getting into high gear, rose again the moderator Prof Boas in defense of the independent media, “regardless of all the discrepancies you are saying about the independent media, including poor remuneration, they still stand as better instruments to set the people-centred agenda, and this is through my experience as senior lecturer, and through evidence -based research elsewhere,” he commented.
This stance was not to be tolerated by the irritated former Daily News editor, who branded Prof Boas as being too theoretical, and lacking the sense of nationalism. “Even in the West there are tools of propaganda like the BBC or the Voice of America,” retorted the emotionalized editor.
Seasoned editor Godfrey Lutego said that the enemy number one of journalists is themselves, because they do not want to put standards that practitioners will be forced to adhere to.
“The enemy number one is within us; all other professions have a defined set of standards, engineers, doctors, teachers, but not journalists why? Today we are just being used by politicians as their stooges, some of them fully tainted by corruption scandals,” he charged.
Adding, he had this to say, “You might find a person as a taxi-driver today and the day after tomorrow he is a journalist, this is ridiculous and very dangerous, simply because one can write does it make him a journalist? We should go for standards,” warned Lutego.
Senior editor and co-owner of a newspaper, Deodatus Balile, said the issue should not be to blame journalists for whatever they do, but to find ways of protecting them.
“We should discuss security of journalists, we must build their capacities in security management and later deal with their ethical issues, if at all they are causatives of their insecurity, after all, the right to life is a fundamental right regardless of one’s weaknesses,” he concluded.
The executive director of the Media Institute of Southern Africa, Tumaini Mwailenge, said that poor remunerations should not make journalists compromise the core values of their profession.
Winding up the debate, Banzi called upon journalists to be security-conscious whenever conducting their affairs, given the situation of threats which involve hijacking, torture and abandonment, as happened recently to Kibanda.
