Case studies


areas of concern to the common citizen have
been neglected. These include wider cover-
age of HIV-AIDS issues and gender-sensitive
reporting among others. Where corruption is
reported, it is mostly related to politics.
The second grouping of the media in Southern
Africa includes Zimbabwe, the DRC, Lesotho
and Swaziland. In these countries, the media
operates under tight control and threats are put
into action. Zimbabwe has in the past few years
banned four newspapers, and exiled several
journalists. The private media operates in a
legal minefield in which literally anything criti-
cal of the ruling elite can result in arrest. If one
escapes arrest, extra-judicial means have been
used including the murder of one independ-
ent camera person and beating of journalists.
Swaziland is increasingly tightening its control
of the media and freedom of expression rights
are trampled upon with impunity and increas-
ingly so. The growing demand for political plu-
rality is drawing the worst out of the world's
last absolute Monarch as marches, processions
and demonstrations are banned. The private
media is increasingly being called upon to
toe the line. The same happens in Lesotho,
where Harvest FM, a private radio station, was
handed a 12-month ban and private journalists
threatened with legal suits and arrests. In the
DRC, independent journalism is rarely toler-
ated and being a critic has dire consequences.
It is important to state that while media and
freedom of expression rights are still very
much in peril, investment in the region's
media is growing, except in a few countries
such as Zimbabwe. And even in Zimbabwe,
hope has been rekindled that a political settle-
ment between the main political rivals might
result in the relaxation of media and freedom
of expression laws. Of importance in Southern
Africa is the growing use of new technologies
in information generation and sharing. It is for
this reason that while the Zimbabwe govern-
ment could afford to ban all foreign media,
the story of Zimbabwe remained in the public
domain regionally and internationally due to
online publishing. Mobile telephone commu-
nication has given the common person new
power to communicate and share information
with few restrictions. A lot, however, still
needs to be done as far as repealing undemo-
cratic media laws goes, and encouraging the
development of media and telecommunica-
tions. Nonetheless, Southern Africa is chang-
ing, albeit slowly. M


SPECIAL ISSUE 2 N.E. DECEMBER 2008


W >rmrjoA/, CUOo ywOU
 Tf FK foe^\Cg





Po/T Ca1 H(l 'ilA
 C W OLOCf MY. I JUt
 i .V*/ VA i


Keywords
Media; Southern Africa; democracy; opposition; multipartism.


bouItIT MiiSH;*


TheP MeiaII Ilnstitut o Soti r l A'!iP fr; ica' (MISA ris a1 reg"onaJ no.iglv, mmintl organlisa-
L Ation w it 'L of ices Iin1 conre in! the4 Sothr A f'r i'a Deelpm n C oTm'iiti i [DC



r"gion. I SA was ofiial lance n1 Sptemb' TL t ler 199 wit the aI'm1L1 1 of p romlti free, 
I1de1endeltSlll and =11a'sli'cL meia, as' envi'age in1 the 199 Widhe Deliin. The
M IS reionaJl sceaiti ae nWnheNmii n oriae n aaia