When truth is twisted: Newslink’s warning to Botswana’s media :: Mmegi Online

The rise and fall of Newslink Africa exposed how journalism can be used to advance hidden agendas. Today, the danger has evolved. In an era of media capture, Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) and strategic use of authentic information as malinformation, Botswana’s media must guard against becoming an unwitting weapon in battles for power and influence – THOMAS THOS NKHOMA*

There is a subtle but dangerous distinction between telling the truth and using the truth to deceive. At first, the statement appears contradictory. How can facts mislead? Yet anyone who has worked in a newsroom knows that truth, when stripped of context, selectively presented or timed to inflict maximum damage, can be just as manipulative as an outright lie.

A photograph can be genuine but cropped to conceal what matters. A quotation can be accurate but isolated from the fuller argument. A document can be authentic but published in a way designed less to inform the public than to settle scores, destroy reputations or advance hidden interests.

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