Rethinking Journalism Practice in Uganda
For long the Journalism profession all over the world has faced criticism of competence and practices that the operators in this field interface with as they go about their work.
As the Journalism and Communication department of Makerere is celebrating 30 years of Journalism in Uganda, there are questions that need to be answered and the academia have only looked on.
The professors in the field have tempted to answer some questions on professionalism but they do it with selfish intents which creates a severe problem. The focus is on the welfare of journalists, the wedges, safety measures, the competition to be first to break the stories and more which only makes their position of being the fourth estate of state at risk. They do not answer the questions related to our native problems. The journalism in Uganda is still an alien to our society.
The debate on the role of journalists in society is a paradox that has never ended since the institution of the discipline.
Whereas lawyers and Doctors have clear operational procedures before they start to operate, for journalists it’s a mystery. The question of how we should carry out our societal role is still a pain.
Recently I watched a morning talk show at NBS a quite famous TV in Uganda, the show tempted to analyze an incident of a shooting on Entebbe Express high way which claimed two lives of a one Joshua and Melina.
The talk show had the cream of the News analysis team of the TV. With due respect to the team, I watched the team trying to mess up the whole incident and for once I pitied the million people that were watching like me. The journalists in attempt to be relevant and out compete other media houses were trying to do what the forensics team and ballistics should do. They attempted to tell the viewers the direction of the bullets and it was a mess.
The pain in which I am writing this article is enormous because I went to Journalism school for four years in Makerere University and it now seems to me that what was taught in class does not matter. The questions of objectivity, fairness, attribution, ethics and all journalism principle seem to stop at the thesis one writes to bag a degree.
Who is to blame? It is absolutely not the training. The academia is doing their job with very good modules being taught at Universities. What happens then once these journalists get to field?
While the competency approach by the lecturers and professors in journalism may be a useful way to conceive desired outcomes and assessment criteria for professional training the products are somewhat subjective.
Ugandan Journalists are failing in explaining and clarifying the issues and in educating the public to participate fully in our democratic process.
They are attracted to sentimental reporting and being vocal on issues that only earn them cheap popularity. This makes them vulnerable and desperate to the enemies of our Nation.
At this rate, it is easy for a journalist to misrepresent his country by working for foreign powers whose agenda is destabilize the development process of the country with intention to keep Uganda alienated and to the mercy of foreign power.
This puts the journalist and the industry at a risk of being over censored by the authorities and the results will be hiccups between the state with some journalists being potential terrorists who trade sensitive information instead of turning into useful consumable content that can hold accountable the government.
There is need for media players to clean up the mess before it becomes a cancer. The angles that are taken makes much of the reporting subjective and out of frame of the real events. Partly, this can blame on globalization and the new media/ social media which has become a threat to objective reporting. And the only way is to stick to principle like verification and counter checking information. It is sad that the main stream is competing with untrained charlatan practitioners and citizen journalists instead of operating along with them and improving their input.
The Writer is an alumnus of Makerere University Journalism School
