Mmegi

Botswana’s media is not the enemy - It’s a mirror of our society

WPFD commemorations at Mass Media complex
WPFD commemorations at Mass Media complex

For the second time President Duma Boko has declared that “90% of Botswana’s media reports are false.” A statement like this especially coming from the highest office in the land, reverberates far beyond the walls where it was uttered.

It lands in every newsroom, echoes through every WhatsApp group where people share links and lingers in the mind of every citizen trying to make sense of the world through the headlines they read. Now, to be clear, the media in Botswana is not perfect. No media system in the world is. But, suggestions that nearly all of it is untrustworthy paint an entire profession with a careless brush.

It simplifies a complicated reality and worse, erodes public trust in one of the key institutions of any democracy, a free and independent press.

Editor's Comment
The Boko-led administration has to tread carefully

‘When you make peace withyourself, you make peace with the world’- Maha GhosanandaThis may come at a huge cost if not handled properly. What started off on Labour Day in Letlhakane this year, where Boko was in attendance when the militant lawyer-cum-trade unionist, Robert Rabasimane rebutted the President’s address in defence of the trade union has seemingly spiralled out of control. The issue is now creating a cat-and-mouse type of a...

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