Here's a warning to Africans viewers, avoid watching CNN news coverage of Africa, it can be bad for your health. Bad for your health because its portrayal of Africa is more often than not, in a negative light and may leave you mad, angry and frustrated. I know the temptation to watch 'Inside Africa' is especially strong for those in the diaspora, since it is one of the few visual links to the place you call home. But you stand to be disappointed more times than you will be pleased.

To think CNN believes this weekly 30 minute programme, dissected all the way by ads, is meant to provide a holistic overview of a large continent like Africa is quite laughable. Even the occasional injection of bits of good news here and there cannot camouflage the overall theme of the coverage. Neither does the clever use of mainly African presenters disguise the underlying desire to depict Africa as a tragic and wayward continent unable to fend for its self. A continent with a major chunk of its inhabitants dying of hunger, AIDS and war.

Ofcourse the Western media has every right to report Africa's problems to the world. However its reporting tends to be grossly unbalanced and ever focused on the negative, giving scant regard to areas of notable progress, development and achievement. Almost like there's a desire to maintain an archaic and dire image of Africa. An image which it helped establish in the minds of its viewers since pre-slavery times. The Western media continues to have a field day at Africa's expense, doing a great disservice to the efforts of many Africans who have made significant changes and progress in their respective locations. Undermining its history, rich culture and tradition and overall historical contribution to world affairs.

There is no doubt Africa has problems. It would be foolish and irresponsible to deny a fact that is abundantly clear. My disapproval of the general reporting on Africa is not meant to overlook the tragedy of Rwanda or make the problems with AIDs any less troubling and dangerous. I am simply driving home the point that a lot of good news is deliberately ignored or goes unreported. Many parts of Africa are quite peaceful and have not known conflicts for a very long time. Military rule is virtually non-existent and many countries have been experiencing steady economic growth and improvements in their democratic processes. I guess stable working African countries are of no real appeal to the Western media. Every nation has its problems. A lot of Western countries are experiencing racial tensions, serious crimes, drug, alcohol, anti-social behaviour, juvenile delinquency and gang warfare problems.

advertisement
So problems are not unique to Africa, but the Western media keeps propagating things by its continuous biased reporting. Africa has about 54 nations in all, yet the problems of a few are used to project and determine the overall image of the continent. Television viewers are inundated with news captions like " AIDS is killing Africa" or " Where have all the parents gone ". The BBC, CNN and SKY News are perpetual culprits of this kind of fatalistic overview of Africa. They make Africa the ideal dumping ground for all that's wrong or bad with the world. Then some get a chance to visit Africa and arrive to see a place teeming with jovial people, going about their daily lives - working, eating, sleeping and loving, just like people anywhere else in the world. They wonder where all the dying victims of AIDS are. How come they can still afford a smile and a friendly welcome, supposedly living on less than 1 Dollar a day. There's a sudden realisation that things don't quite add up and there has been some error in the calculations.

I am by no means pointing the finger of blame for Africa's woes solely on the West. They have been sufficiently aided and abetted by inept, corrupt and short-sighted African political leadership who in my opinion must take most of the blame. Leaders who sold their souls to the Devil and so misgoverned their respective states, they expose their people to all kinds of exploitation. The richest continent in the world, in terms of mineral and natural resources, is the poorest and most disenfranchised, and the West capitalises on this. We have all seen footages of food commodities being dropped from the sky just so the media can film a horde of hungry Africans scrambling for survival. Or some teary-eyed individuals demonstrating their absolute empathy by helping to feed emaciated children. What is seldom shown are the efforts of many African individuals and organisations who work endlessly to improve the lot of their fellow country folk. The media does not inform its viewers the role foreign policies and unfair trade deals of their governments play in creating and sustaining many of these dire situations.

There's no shortage of Western journalists, actors, charity workers and so-called celebrities heading for Africa, armed with cameras to capture every inch of their philanthropy, charity or display of sympathy. It is a rather trendy thing, for it could breathe life into a flagging career or be a springboard to fame for others.

Now, don't get me wrong, there are quite a number of people genuinely serious and passionate about helping the world's poorest, marginalised and disadvantaged. Former US Presidents, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, along with the likes of Bob Geldof, Bono and Oprah Winfrey are good examples. Bob Geldof in particular is not new to this. His quest to help poor Africans began way back in the 80's with his Live Aid concert, which had a major impact and drew the world's attention to the plight of suffering Ethiopians. I vividly recall his famous outburst, where he slammed his fist hard on the table and charged the viewing British public to ' give him the money '. That clip really captured the anger, passion and emotion of a frustrated man and caught the attention of not just the British audience but the wider world. Even Africans politicians where somewhat bemused as to why a long haired, unshaven European artist felt so passionately about African lives, when they just took them for granted.

However I believe something has been lost along the way as reporting on Africa's problems has become mostly a bankable media activity. Geldof, unknowingly set a trend which numerous personalities have been trying to emulate since. After his famous outrage, a flurry of activities gripped nearly all media houses. Flight bookings to Ethiopia hit the sky, even though many were just learning of Ethiopia for the first time. Western reporters and their crew filled almost every seat on flights bound for Ethiopia. It was a real media feeding frenzy, for each team wanted to hurriedly capture the most graphic scenes of human suffering they could beam back to eager and now drooling viewers back home. This, I believe is how the plight and pain of suffering Africans became fantastic television for viewers in the West.

Still, it must be pointed out that a lot of good came out of this. Many lives have been saved and numerous useful projects put in place by individuals and countless charity organisations. What is questionable though, is if Africa still benefits from this kind of media attention today. Pictures of Africans in despair and desperation on Western TV screens appears to be a special and increasing media favourite. Despite the many positive strides being made across the continent, Africa still struggles to shake off this image of a doomed continent and remains an enchanting case study for the rest of the world. News about Africa is largely reported by non-Africans and focused on anything that will capture the interest of their home viewers. Annoyingly these reporters bypass city centres and areas of marked development and head straight for remote villages or slumps, where they can easily stick cameras in the faces of unsuspecting people. I suppose stories of Africans making progress or living normal lives is not half as interesting as gritty tales of abject poverty, famine, supposed child labour and disease.

This is not as harmless as it seems. Having lived in the West for about 18 years now, one comes to the realisation that this pattern of news coverage is a carefully choreographed mechanism designed to give the Western viewer a sense of comfort and superiority over other peoples and nations. And Africa holds a particularly titillating and amusing appeal, especially when things are not going well. Perhaps there is a secret desire for it to remain just the way it is, inherent with hunger and disease, war and famine, not peaceful, modernised with proper infrastructures and working towns and cities.

The media is a very powerful tool in shaping people's opinions and thinking. In my view, its use by the West has done more harm than good, and has given many a skewed perception of Africa and its people. It has discouraged business and tourism to many parts. It has wrongly stigmatised Africans in the eyes of many, partly why they often receive rather poor reception when they travel to many parts of the world.

One seldom sees broadcasts of the ills and shortcomings of Western nations. Yet they take their cameras into other parts of the world and surreptitiously intrude on peoples lives. How much coverage is given to the problems of xenophobia and racism, where in some European countries people of colour are being hunted down like game and snuffed out with seething hatred? Isn't this news worthy enough? Obviously not to the Western media, this will only depict them as barbaric savages, a trait much easier to bestow on Africans. The genocide in Rwanda is constantly revisited to affirm this notion. Although United Nations and many Western nations were repeatedly and adequately informed of this impending catastrophe, they folded their arms and did nothing. The possibility of a good long spell of gory media coverage was placed above the interests and lives of almost a million Rwandans.

The Western media wants the world to believe that Africans are pretty disposed to monumental savagery, and would probably point to the Congo, Dafur, Rwanda, Sierra Leone as clear examples. How often are the atrocities of the Bristish, French, American and Spanish aired on TV. Only Adolf Hitler and the Nazis get regular attention, and I suspect this is partly to comfort the Jews or to satisfy the secret fascination some have for der Führer's Aryan ambition. Speaking of genocide, aren't the Americans, the Spanish and Hitler's Nazis the most successful at this. One only needs to look at how the Red Indians (native Americans) have been sadistically wiped off the face of North America. Or the Spanish and their brutal eradication of the Aztecs and Incans in South America. And what about the brutal and savage enslavement of more than 30 million Africans, the very people the Western media wont leave in peace today. So do not be fooled into believing that Africans are the greatest perpetrators of the genocide.

Nevertheless changes are afoot. As more westerners begin to travel to various destinations around the world, they begin to see for themselves the truth and misrepresentation. There's no doubt they will see poverty, diseases and chaotic, poorly managed cities. But they will also see a vibrant people, who in spite of their disadvantages politically, economically and educationally, look for ingenious ways of surviving. That the lives of some these people does not differ greatly from theirs and in some cases may be even better. They may also learn that their own government's political decisions are partly to blame for some of the problems many of these countries face.

The world is wising up to the true history and politics of the world. The advent of the internet gives people anywhere in the world access to alternative news and information that might have otherwise been constrained by powerful governments and unreported by mainstream media organisations. People are beginning to tell their own stories and film their own events.

As far as Africa is concerned, it is up to its people and political leaders to shake off this image of a failed continent. They must run better governments aimed at improving the lot of their people. There's a need for more international media forums where Africans can report their own news and tell their own stories, instead of having someone else manipulate and contort these to suit their own ends. This way we can begin to correct the misrepresentation of Africa and re-educate people and draw the world attention to the varying aspects of this rich and diverse continent, still standing strong despite many decades of hardship, brutality and marginalization it has experienced.


http://www.africanevents.com/Essay-RaymondTB-WesternMedia.htm

Brilliant

nice lecture. but the CNN/BBC alliance is known for bad news. they go wherever there is bad news. we saw them in katrina, tsunami of indonesia, terrorism of middle-east, etc. it is only natural that they report of wars, violence, famine etc in africa. i insist, until we clean up our act, we have only ourselves to blame. why dont we dissapoint those guys? if we clean up our act they will have nothing to report.

until this is done, they'll continue to show our sh-t to the world. however we could work hard and build an efficient international media outfit that can report our good side. but no, we place adverts in the same CNN showcasing our country only for their next report to cancel the advert.

where is our common sense say the truth. our continent reeks of inefficacy. we only have ourselves to blame. every nation gets the govt it deserves

otele:

nice lecture. but the CNN/BBC alliance is known for bad news. they go wherever there is bad news. we saw them in katrina, tsunami of indonesia, terrorism of middle-east, etc. it is only natural that they report of wars, violence, famine etc in africa. i insist, until we clean up our act, we have only ourselves to blame. why don't we dissapoint those guys? if we clean up our act they will have nothing to report.

until this is done, they'll continue to show our sh-t to the world. however we could work hard and build an efficient international media outfit that can report our good side. but no, we place adverts in the same CNN showcasing our country only for their next report to cancel the advert.

where is our common sense say the truth. our continent reeks of inefficacy. we only have ourselves to blame. every nation gets the govt it deserves

All TCUBE is trying to say is that news about Africa is exaggerated on these media stations.
These media stations still paint Africans as people living 1000 years behind other civilized nations!

look at all of una wey get money dey talk say oyinbo dey make us look bad, go to Jigawa State, Kebbi, Yola or Taraba state and i would show the real nigeria, and we've not started talking about the Republic of Nigers or the Ugandas (where 8 year olds sleep with there uncles so as to get money to go to school) , Namibias, Swazilands. So you rich pikins that are in the US or who live in Lagos, Abuja, PHC and spend time going to country clubs should better shut up and open your eyes and realize that 70% of your population is living in poverty and the remaining 30% of you  are a minority.

That's why i don't like watching inside Africa on CNN.
FRENCH NEWS ABOUT AFRICA IS ONLY POVERTY

y 'all are right about cnn and the news but i think they have no choice but to eventually change especially with the strides nigeria is making,saw it on telly last week zenith bank has just taken over sole sponsorship of inside africa and i honestly believe thats just the beginning, im sure other companies like glo and other nigerian companies will follow in zeniths example

Like Africa needs any help!

Oh please spare us!

lucabrasi:

y 'all are right about cnn and the news but i think they have no choice but to eventually change especially with the strides nigeria is making,saw it on telly last week zenith bank has just taken over sole sponsorship of inside africa and i honestly believe thats just the beginning, im sure other companies like glo and other nigerian companies will follow in zeniths example

Zenith should have invested that money in the Nigerian media industry to make them more viable and heard. If we invest more at home and stop stealing to ship abroad, we will be better off. Too much of our resources get flown abroad and that's a great problem which we are yet to resolve.

The media should do more to expose the ills in foreign lands and instil pride in everything Nigerian. Maybe then we'll have people willing to buy Nigerian and production will recieve a boost. With that boost, quality of the products will also be enhanced etc.

Blatant:

Zenith should have invested that money in the Nigerian media industry to make them more viable and heard. If we invest more at home and stop stealing to ship abroad, we will be better off. Too much of our resources get flown abroad and that's a great problem which we are yet to resolve.

The media should do more to expose the ills in foreign lands and instil pride in everything Nigerian. Maybe then we'll have people willing to buy Nigerian and production will recieve a boost. With that boost, quality of the products will also be enhanced etc.

yea you r right,but dont forget its not the bank's fault we have bad leaders though ill grant you the fact that they help these guys move the money abroad,what zenith is doing with the sponsorship will help nigeria and its image internationally than investing in the nigerian media, if we could have nigerian estabs doing the same thing zenith is doing oprah wouldnt have the chance to sponsor a cnn programme about nigerian scammers for GOD knows how long and the abc' s20;20 programme amongst other damaging showcasing of nigeria and crimes,the westerners snd their media know it ll be a threat for the status quo if nigeria was to have good leadership or an injection of foreign investments so they ll do anything to sabotage the nigerian dream

I would rather watch CNN, where portrayal of Africa, even if is exagerrated at times, is better than some governmental news agencies that try to ridiculously gloss over our problems.

Bad news is 'good' news to the media.

Besides, I don't see anything wrong in the media highlighting the lows of any continent in the world. Even the USA currently facing a recession is not immune to such coverage.