“When journalists measure their success or their ethics by the size of their readership or their audience, by the profits of their companies or by their incomes, status and visibility, they have caved in to the temptations of worshiping idols/false gods.” (Thomas Rosentiel, Thinking Clearly: Cases in Journalistic Decision Making.)
We are in a generation where the core roles of journalism have lost value, it’s no longer about information, Education and humanity, it’s about fame and money. As an organisation that stands for PEACE, we have been concerned over the manner at which media has contributed to the growing rate of Violent Extremism, we understand that some have contributed unknowingly but we all have seen the damage. Through the Bridges to Peace Project which we are implementing in partnership with the Kofi Annan
Foundation with a generous funding from the European Union, we have conducted a two days workshop intentionally for capacity building for local and National media actors on Preventing/Countering Violent Extremism.
The workshop attracted 20 journalists from the four Uganda districts where the Bridges to Peace project is being implemented, during the workshop, we had the honour to host the EU Delegation in Uganda Head of Governance & Social Inclusion Mr. Nicolas Gonze who was our guest of honour.In his remarks Mr Nicolas Gonze put an emphasis on the contributors to violent extremism, in his words he said, “there is no single pathway to violent extremism, but we know that extremism flourishes when human rights are violated, political space is shrunk, aspirations for inclusion are ignored, and too many people especially young people lack prospects and meaning in their lives As we see in Syria, Libya and elsewhere, violent extremists also make unresolved and prolonged conflicts even more intractable”. Mr Gonze also highlighted to Journalists and our team the focus of the project, “the project will directly contribute to 6 of the 13 pillars of the recently approved Uganda National Strategy and Action plan for Preventing/Countering Violent Extremism and Terrorism namely: Priority Area 2 on Engaging Communities; Priority Area 3 on Dialogue and Conflict Prevention; Priority Area 4 focused on Strengthening
good governance, human rights, and the rule of law; Priority area 6 on Gender equality and empowerment of Women; Priority area 8 on Strategic communication; and Priority area 11 on response to violent extremism and terrorism” he said.
The two days training was a moment of challenging the participants (Journalists) on the major spots they were missing out when during reporting on Violent Extremism activities, the lessons from the facilitators highlighted the need to Promote Prevention/Countering Violent Extremisms narratives. On the last day of the training we received some really positive feedback from the participants, a one Chris Higenyi, renown journalist from NTV Uganda had this to say “Sometimes we assume that we know and we
are informed but this training has challenged me to think in a more dynamic way as a journalist, this has been a very insightful Training”.
Charles Etukuri a senior Journalist from New Vision said “this training is very good, I suggest that your organisation extends it to the Editors of the Media houses where we are working, because even when we do good stories, the Editors determine what should be published. “This training has helped me to understand how to deal with people who have attached the narrative of Violent Extremism to us the Muslims, I hope to do my work better and help promote Prevention/Countering Violent Extremism (P/CVE) through my work. Magembe Farish, Journalist andReporter” said.
As result of this training we have had our first TV feature story done by one Journalist from the National Television (UBC TV), Mr Okurut Henry did a story highlighting the need for journalists to understand how to report Violent Extremism stories which he also posted on his YouTube channel, you can watch the story through the link https://youtu.be/rrzWXvOsBic.
We are grateful to our Partner Kofi Annan Foundation for the continued technical and moral support, we look forward to a great impact through the Bridges to Peace Project.
