The Return of the Military Man to the Media

The straight connection between the military and the media used to be that you first went to the state broadcaster to announce your coup d’etat. That was it - and the other media took the cue.   The age of multi-party democracy has done away with this kind of straightforward relationship. In most African countries the government still determines what happens at the state - or now euphemistically called - “public” broadcaster. Nowadays the control is exerted in more subtle ways than by military means. But recently we can detect a more sinister development: The Return of the Military Man to the media sector through the back door.

The most glaring and recent example: The Zimbabwean Minister for Media, Information and Publicty, Webster Shamu appointing eight former military men to the boards of the six parastatals under his ministry. What counts in the new/old Zimbabwe are obviously not skills in media management but connections to the military junta pulling the strings of Marionette-Mugabe. To have somebody on the media board like Retired Major General Gibson Mashingaidze tested in dirty deeds at the Central Intelligence Office or similar outfits is supposed to send the right message to the media: “Write or broadcast what we tell you because you know what we did and still can do?” That is symbolic politics at its most efficient.

 

In Botswana it is the President Lieutenant General Seretse Khama Ian Khama himself who seems to be running the country and media matters in the style of a general which he was. President Ian Khama, son of the independence leader Sir Seretse Khama and ex-Commander of the Botswana Defence Force last year told his Information Minister to take over the independent and well functioning Botswana Press Council and turn it into a media watchdog which lies at the minister’s feet. The respective law was called the “Media Practitioners Act”.

 

Then the new President-General told the state broadcaster that he was to be the main actor in the new series called “Election Campaign”, which even caused the ever so complicit National Broadcasting Board to protest.

 

In next door Zambia it is Information Minister Lieutenant General Ronnie Shikapwasha, who is running media affairs in a similar style quoting the Botswanan “Media Practitioners Act” as a possible model for his country. Here fesmedia Africa has some sympathy with the exasperated military man since the dilly-dallying Zambian media organisations have for years preferred internecine fighting to coming up with a structure for an independent and functioning Media Council. Yet, as understandable the former Lieutenant General’s impatience might be, the question what makes a retired Airforce General an expert in media matters remains. Or was this a subconscious reflex of President Banda to have the right kind of person in the right place in case the media need some discipline?

 

And last but not least South Africa. Here the new Communications Minister Siphiwe Nyanda has come up with a new “Public Service Broadcasting Bill” last week that ignores many tested democratic practices und purports to bring the Public Broadcaster in line with the “developmental goals” of the state.

 

No, it wasn’t that President Zuma appointed the former field commander of Umkhonto weSizwe (MK) turned Chief of the “South African National Defence Forces” to put the Public Broadcaster SABC under state control – although the Bill in many ways would make such a possibility a lot easier. No, it was just that when President Zuma was putting together his cabinet, he looked at this old and tested General and put him at the helm of the Communications Department in case somebody needed a message. Read comrade for competence, and you get the idea.

Now the comrade wants to get things done the way he knows it which unfortunately is utterly harmful to the media and Public Broadcasting sector in South Africa, a crucial, highly contentious and most complicated battle field in any young democracy.

 

Where does this leave us with the agenda of media reform in Southern Africa?

 

In Zimbabwe the militarization of the media bodies is just the most poignant illustration of who really rules the country – the military junta with its frontman Robert Mugabe.

 

In Botswana and Zambia the deployment of military men to the media sector seem to indicate the subconscious readiness of the governments to clamp down on the media if need be.

 

In South Africa it seems to be the impatience and ignorance of the General in media office which threatens to sabotage all the efforts to use the crisis of the Public Broadcaster for a comprehensive reform that guarantees the independence of the SABC from the state and the government of the day.

 

The return of the military man to the media does not provide a solution to its many problems. Yet it is a worrying indication of how tenuous the political will in today’s ruling parties is to guarantee the independence and freedom of media.

 

 

-November 9, 2009 by Rolf Paasch, fesmedia Africa