Remarks by chairPerson of the SADC Media Awards Adjudication Committee, Livhuwani Mutshatshi at the thank you dinner for the SADC Media Awards
It gives me great pleasure to address you on this very important occasion when we gather to celebrate excellence in reporting on regional integration. I am delighted that as South Africa takes over the rotating SADC chairship at the summit level, we have also assumed the chairship of the Regional Adjudication Committee (RAC) for the SADC Media Awards for the coming year. The National Adjudication Committee for the Republic of South Africa pays gratitude to the Kingdom of Swaziland for its steering leadership of the RAC since August 2016. We promise to build on the work done by Swaziland and other previous chairs as well as work closely with colleagues from other National Adjudication Committees during the coming year.
Ladies and gentlemen
To most of us, SADC as a regional body and the results of its regional integration efforts are not well known. The only time many of us get to hear about the organisation is when our leaders leave our shores for the SADC summit in another country. I want to believe I speak on behalf of most of us when I say there is much more to SADC than those travels and the endless meetings that our leaders attend. SADC is much more than talk shows and a lot more is achieved. Much has been achieved with respect to the SADC regional integration agenda but that narrative still remains largely untold. This is where we come in as members of the media.
We need to interrogate our role as the media in Southern Africa. Are we doing enough as far as raising awareness on this project called the Southern African Development Community? As the media we have an important role to communicate the achievements or challenges faced by SADC in implementing its regional integration agenda. We are the eyes and ears of society and need to communicate that which we see or hear about SADC – good or bad.
Ladies and gentlemen
As the media we play the watchdog role for everything that our governments commit themselves to, including the regional integration agenda. As most of you may be aware, at the SADC level our governments have signed more than 30 protocols, declarations and other legal instruments since 1992. We have a duty as the media in Southern Africa to hold our governments to account for their implementation of these commitments. The rest of society relies on us to “bark” as it were whenever we notice that there are problems somewhere. However, more importantly we owe it to our communities, and indeed to ourselves, to highlight the benefits of regional integration. I want to believe that there have been a lot of successes recorded by SADC over the years. We need to highlight those small but positive steps that our governments have made as they embark on this journey to achieve regional integration in Southern Africa.
Ladies and gentlemen
It will be remiss of me to talk about what we need to do as the media without also highlighting some of the challenges we face in discharging our duty. Chief among these is the lack of access to adequate information on the status of SADC projects or programmes. What we write about SADC is as good as the information we get. If there is no information provided or if we don’t get prompt responses from our government officials or from the SADC Secretariat, we tend to speculate. My challenge, therefore, is for the creation of open lines of communication between the media and government officials at Member State level or between the media and the SADC Secretariat.
Similarly, the information provided should be in accessible language which is easy to interpret, and not the technical jargon that only economists and other specialists would understand. We owe it to the about 300 million people in our region to explain what exactly it is that our governments are doing at the regional level. To the ordinary person in South Africa, Angola, Malawi, Tanzania or Zambia, talk about the Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan (RISDP) or the SADC Industrialisation Strategy and Roadmap is all high-sounding terminology that does not resonate with their aspirations or expectations. It is therefore incumbent upon our officials to help us as the media to explain, in very simple terms, what these programmes, policies and strategies mean for them.
Ladies and gentlemen
I would like to propose a number of measures that would promote greater visibility for SADC programmes and activities. The SADC Secretariat and Member States should organise familiarisation tours to showcase progress on some of the programmes or projects being implemented. For instance, journalists could be taken on tour of the Lesotho Highland Water Project or the Kazungula Border Project in order to appreciate what it is that the region is trying to achieve. This would go a long way in facilitating the media’s role as a SADC partner for awareness raising.
I would also like to challenge the SADC Secretariat to introduce regular briefings and/or update reports on the various regional programmes and activities as a way of bridging the gap between the regional body and the media. Such regular updates would ensure that the media across the region is kept abreast of the status of programmes and projects implemented at the regional level.
Finally, there should be a sustained training programme for journalists from the region, similar to the one that we had here in South Africa last month where members of the media from across SADC were taken through key aspects of the SADC Industrialisation Strategy and Roadmap. This is crucial in building that critical mass of journalists who are knowledgeable about SADC regional integration issues.
Ladies and gentlemen
This brings me to the issue we are gathered here for this evening. The SADC Media Awards have over the years become an important tool through which the region seeks to raise awareness about its programmes and activities. Launched in 1996, the main objectives of the annual SADC Media Awards is to promote regional integration through information dissemination as well as to promote journalism excellence in the region. Every year journalists are invited to submit entries of articles on SADC regional integration that they would have written during the previous calendar year. Winners are recognised at the SADC Summit for their excellence in the categories of Print Journalism, Television Journalism, Radio Journalism, and Photo-journalism.
I must say the quality of entries continues to improve every year. We, however, need to do more to promote the awards if we are to ensure greater visibility of SADC. During the past year, only a total of 27 entries were received from 11 SADC Member States, which loosely translates to about two entries per country. This is not an encouraging statistic and we need to do more during the coming year to ensure that we generate interest among members of the media. I, therefore, believe that some of my earlier proposals about improving access to information will come in handy in this regard.
Let me turn to the rules of the competition. The competition usually opens at the beginning of the year, with journalists expected to submit entries to their respective National Adjudication Committees by the end of February or March. The entries should have been published/broadcast between January and December of the year preceding the awards by a registered and/or authorized media house or agency or carried on a website of a registered and/or authorized media house or agency in any of the SADC Member States. The themes of the entries to be submitted for the competition must be on issues and activities promoting regional integration in the SADC region, i.e. infrastructure, economy, water, culture, sports, agriculture, etc.
All media practitioners who are SADC nationals may enter the competition, except those in institutions contracted by SADC and the SADC Secretariat staff. All works entering the competition should be in one of the SADC working languages, i.e. English, Portuguese, French and any national indigenous language of the SADC region and should be submitted as they were published/broadcast (newspaper cutting, websites, magazines, audio CDs or video cassettes/DVDs, newsletters.
Ladies and gentlemen
In conclusion, it is incumbent upon all of us to promote the awards, which I believe are an essential vehicle for ensuring that SADC becomes more visible and its programmes and activities continue to benefit our countries and communities.
Merci
Obrigado
I thank you.
