African presidents and editors are to debate the thorny issue of media freedom on the continent at next month’s African Union summit in Accra, Ghana.
This was announced on Thursday by chairperson of The African Editors’ Forum (TAEF) Mathatha Tsedu.
He told a meeting of the TAEF council in Cape Town that the one-hour debate had been agreed in TAEF talks with AU Commission chairperson Alpha Konare.
The editors will choose a representative from each of the five TAEF regions on the continent, and have ”in arrogance” suggested that the presidential panel be made up of the leaders of Algeria, Senegal, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Tanzania and South Africa.
TAEF delegates at the meeting said that among the issues that should be raised in the debate are the continent’s laws on insulting heads of state, access to information legislation and the need for the AU’s peer-review process to include media freedom.
Tsedu told the South African Press Association that the debate is intended as a ”groundbreaking exercise” where dialogue begins.
”There’s been a lot of trading of insults between politicians and media people and we’re saying that we need to create a space where actual dialogue can take place,” he said.
”We can then agree on this becoming maybe an annual thing at every summit.”
It can then bring in different editors, different leaders and different issues.
The AU has protocols to protect media freedom and freedom of expression, but many countries are not living up to them.
”The key point is, how can the AU become effective in ensuring that its own protocols are observed,” he said.
Tsedu also said it had been agreed that 2008 would be declared an African Media Year. — Sapa