Regional forum on media, peace and security in West Africa – Abidjan 14-15 June 2012
Deputy Minister of Information and Communications, Sheka Tarawallie early this week told media practitioners that a key challenge facing the media in West Africa is lack of education and the capacity to manage security information as against the sustenance of the Peace and security of the State.
Mr. Tarawallie said this while addressing over 70 delegates from various media organizations and UN Agencies at the Regional Forum on Media, Peace and Security in West Africa organized by the United Nations Office for West Africa (UNOWA) at the Golf Hotel Abidjan, Cote D’Ivoire on 14th June, 2012.
Dilating on the topic, “The Role of the Media in Peace and Security in West Africa-Challenges and Opportunities”, Mr. Tarawallie informed delegates that in West Africa and Sierra Leone in particular, Journalism is perceived as a job for school drop outs. This perception cuts across the entire West Africa sub-region to the extent that Journalists are not taken seriously and therefore not considered important in the development of the State.
“Journalists must be educated and properly capacitated if they are to be professional in the performance of their duties especially during conflict situations. Inasmuch as, the Journalist would like to report an exclusive story relating to a crisis in his/her country, he/she must also be mindful of the continuity of the State. If reporting a particular story will lead to chaos or anarchy, it is the responsibility of the Journalist to withhold that story in the interest of the peace and stability of the State.” Mr. Tarawallie explained.
He insisted that there should be large-scale investment in the media so that practitioners should be able to rise up to the challenges of their profession, calling for a conference where journalists and politicians should meet and discuss matters of state, “because when a conflagration occurs, nobody is spared – journalists perish, civilians die, politicians are slain.”
Highlighting examples of reports from Journalists during the crisis in Cote D’Ivoire, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea Bissau , Mali and Guinea various speakers dilated on the dynamics that threaten peace and security in the sub-region vis-à-vis intra-State problems, military coups, transnational crimes, political instability etc. and identified challenges the media face while reporting on these issues. The need for State actors to constantly dialogue with the media came out glaringly as experiences from the sub- region points at Governments respecting foreign media more that their local media.
Governments in the sub-region as a way of enhancing dialogue between the Media and defence and security forces must involve the media in the Security Sector Reform (SSR) process particularly in conflict and post conflict situations. In most conflict and post conflict countries, the security forces be it Police or Military always appoint Junior Officers to relate with the media and in most cases these officers are not trained to perform such tasks. These seeming communication gaps further endanger the lives of the Journalist wanting to report on security matters.
Ronald David Kayanja of UNESCO in his contribution told the meeting that UN agencies are concerned about the safety of Journalists in conflict situations. In that regard, he said a resolution has been drafted for the attention of the UN Security Council and the UN General Assembly regarding the safety of Journalists.
BY KWAME YANKSON
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