President Must Meet The Media

Editor | Monday May 10, 2010 00:00

The interview, indeed, touched on a number of issues that are of public interest such as the mephato floggings in Mochudi, the sacking of top civil servants, democracy, poverty eradication efforts and other developments.

That the President granted the interview to a private radio station is indeed commendable. We are aware that there have been one or two occasions when the President appeared on private radio stations, including the one he recently gave on Yarona FM on his birthday.

As a professed democrat, Khama should surely know that the media is the pillar of democracy and should endeavour to meet the press as often as he tours the rural areas.

He must realise too that he does himself a lot of disservice by treating the media and private media practitioners in particular as if they were pariahs and yet they are servants of the people as they give a voice to the voiceless majority.

In fact Khama has to be reminded that his predecessors - Sir Ketumile Masire and Festus Mogae - regularly conducted interviews with local media and held press conferences as well.While President Khama has been doing a commendable job in reaching out to the common man in the street, and in the rural areas, there is also a perception that his consultation process is not inclusive enough because other stakeholders in our society are marginalised.

As Botswana joins the international community in celebrating World Press Freedom Day, we wish to encourage the President to also schedule his tours to include institutions of higher learning, like other presidents in developed democracies do. As it is now people have come to the conclusion that for Khama, democracy or consultation, simply means hopping from one village to another to appear important in the eyes of hapless rural dwellers.

It is  our conviction that in a democracy  the president should  always be looking forward to an engaging media environment; the one that attempts without compromise to hold the torch-bearers accountable for their every action.

It follows then that a democratic president  should always see it as his duty to entertain challenging and probing media questions and dispel notions that he prefers entertaining only foreign-based media houses like the AP, CNN, BBC, the Times of London while running away from the local media which is well vested in local issues.We are not saying granting interviews to the international media is wrong, in fact we encourage it, the President should  maintain the momentum, he is doing very well in that area, but as they say, charity begins at home.