Page 17 - AIB | The Chanel | Issue 1 2013

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IN CONVERSATION | THE CHANNEL
got involved right at the
beginning and I stayed with
it. Between 2006 and 2007
we conducted studies with
the BBC World Service
Trust as well as regional
consultations with the
UNECA to get an idea of the state
of media on the continent. In 2008,
we approached the Gates
Foundation with recommendations
based on the results of these studies
and they agreed to give seed funds
to create an institution which was
to become AMI. I was chosen by
my colleagues on the initial
Steering Committee to lead this
initiative – the reason was that as
co‐founder of AllAfrica Global
Media and allafrica.com I knew
most of the key media players in
Africa and had a pretty good
knowledge of issues faced by the
industry continent wide. I was
tasked with making AMI a reality.
It was a long process. AMI was
finally incorporated in March 2010
in Nairobi, Kenya. Itʹs a pan‐
African initiative that aims to
provide the continent’s media
owners and practitioners with the
tools they need to play an effective
role in their societies by promoting
democratic governance, human
development and economic
transformation.
What is AMI's approach?
In order to really transform the
media landscape you need to have
a holistic approach. And that means
itʹs not enough to focus on freedom
of expression and freedom of the
press – regardless of their
paramount importance ‐ because if
you focus on that and the media
doesnʹt have the financial means to
do their daily work or you donʹt
have well trained professionals
then you are not solving any
problems. So the holistic approach
meant addressing five key issues.
First and foremost itʹs the regularly
environment in which media
operates which means working
with governments to have a wider
space of press freedom and
freedom of expression. Second is
creating a mechanism for media
houses to access funding ‐ we saw
how difficult it was for a media
house to access funding from
banks, either completely impossible
or at prohibitive interest rates. The
third aspect was to make sure that
media on the continent embraces
new information communication
technologies, the digital revolution.
And the fourth aspect was issues
around ethics and leadership that
needed to be addressed at the
highest level possible in media
houses. When surveying the
African media landscape we
realised there were serious
problems around ethics and
leadership, mostly as a
consequence of the fact that media
houses could not access adequate
funding, therefore journalists were
not paid and they, as well as media
operators, resorted to ʹbrown
envelopesʹ to get some money for
themselves or their institution. The
fifth issue was simply the lack of
research on media within countries.
Therefore, when we created AMI
we decided to make sure that we
are not just focusing on one area.
What insights did the recent AMLF
bring?
The African Media Leaders Forum
(AMLF) is our annual conference.
We organised the first one in 2008
in Dakar and this has now grown
into the continentʹs largest
gathering of media owners and
operators. In November 2012 the
theme was ʹStrengthening media
and governance through citizensʹ
engagement and innovationʹ. In
Africa, we have about 700m people
who have access to the mobile
phone. In most African countries in
urban areas ‐ including the
secondary cities – young people
armed with their mobile phone are
actually contributing one way or
I
REBOOTING
JOURNALISM
The African Media Initiative (AMI) today is a major force driving progress in the
media landscape on the African continent. Its genesis can be traced back to 2004
when Amadou Mahtar Ba was one of a handful of African professionals invited by the
British government to give their input to the 'Africa Report' for the Gleneagles G8
summit. He was determined that the ideas should not remain dormant in drawers –
so how did he turn the concept of AMI into reality?
To
transform
themedia
landscape
you need
a holistic
approach
THE CHANNEL | ISSUE 1 2013 | 17
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