Africa – is Bad News a Media Obsession?

It is said that Africa and African countries tend to be reported in the mass media as only an item(s) of bad news!  We need to think about this because looking at several national UK newspapers this morning Africa doesn’t have the monopoly for bad news: Mumbai; Burma, Thailand, Laos, China, UK in fact there is bad news from almost everywhere on this planet from many countries.

In Africa we know the bad news: Mugabe’s dictatorship of Zimbabwe and the struggle of the masses for freedom;  the Congo region and the constant wars; Darfur – again in constant war: famine becomes an issue from time to time – mass starvation!  Violence in Nigeria as Christians and muslims battle it out; ungovernable Somalia and pirates.

We are sure there is good news but if those who are concerned about why the media reports bad news from Africa – we have to say look again as the media focusses on bad news from everywhere: including the USA, the UK- anywhere you look – The fact is bad news sells newspapers and it is good for TV advertising revenue in between TV news bulletins. So the answer is that the mass media is in business because bad news sells! So it’s not just Africa it’s everywhere you look. But this is part of the service that a free press provides. Freedom of the press is an essential in free and democratic societies.

But if people are suffering isn’t better we know; isn’t better for them so that people elsewhere can help and provide aid; if only “good news” is published it would create a false impression it would please many of Africa’s gangster presidents. Any media publishing only “good news” would virtually be a state run agency an Orwellian media. We cannot close our eyes to repression in Africa.

There are dictators in Africa who would welcome hiding the suffering of their people in supposed “good news” – Mugabe’s done this for years; we cannot allow that to happen the world needs to know in regard to Africa and elsewhere about human rights abuses; disease, starvation, human suffering and war. Freedom of the press is an essential in a free and democratic society.