Media Research has demonstrated a persistent gender imbalance of male dominance in media content through portrayal, topics, placement, sourcing and language against women.
Through a content monitoring intervention targeting gender responsiveness from media, Uganda Media Women’s Association (UMWA) in partnership with World Associates for Christian Communication (WACC),collectively assessed 11 media outlets. The assessed cut across selected programs/news sections in print, broadcast and online, to collaboratively guide in understanding how women and men are represented in disseminated content.
Purposive of this intervention between March-June 2022, has been, to help media through selected programs, to identify, understand and progressively improve gender gaps in their content and its presentation. This was directional to encouraging self-mechanisms for gender responsiveness of media houses.
Among the media houses collaboratively worked with were: Bukedde 1, Galaxy FM, Ddembe FM, Daily Monitor, New Vision, Chimp reports, Sqoop online publication.
The 2020 GMMP report released by UMWA observed that there was a low women visibility in news media, only at 24% as news sources and subjects compared to their male counterparts. And yet, only achieved at a 6% rate over a ten year-period of time and a staggering progress as of the March-June 2022 gender responsive media monitoring engagements.
Least departing, the past four months monitoring witnessed that males dominated most of the talk show panels. In the instance that women were present in conversation either as a source or subject across broadcast and print, they were misrepresented through insensitive, sexiest and passive language and positioning.
In one of the broadcast programs monitored, of the seven shows assessed, five were male panel dominated while another, in a celebrity topical discussion, the female subject was sexually described and projected in accordance to social taste. This projection therefore diminishes a woman into objection, belittlement and by voice dispositioned.
Godfrey Mubuuke, a program producer on Bukedde 1 and similarly one of the programs monitored, Akabbinkano, shared that media should not entirely be blamed for the male dominance but also on women who come with hesitancy when sought to be sources in stories or talk shows.
“At least as media we have tried and continue to try to be gender inclusive and sensitive but we are equally challenged by how hesitant women are when it comes to interviewing and interesting them into a show. Personally, to have a female on Akabbinkano program, I must engage 10 women to get one willing party,” Godfrey related.
He added that the nature of media especially broadcast is such a time bound one, which requires immediacy and so situationally, a reporter/producer ends up having males as their sources.
Nevertheless, Godfrey recognized that the gender imbalances and challenges have alternative solutions among which, stakeholder engagements with media management and reporters/presenters on relevance of gender responsiveness and how in all cost and mechanics this can be achieved.
Over the past four years, UMWA as a focal media organization deliberate on gender and media has extended gender sensitive reporting trainings to over 500 journalists across the country.
Similarly, media and policy makers have been engaged equally on developing and enforcing specific gender policies that encourage gender responsiveness in media, in order to elevate women visibility in news media and eliminate stereotypical reinforcements about women.
Uganda has witnessed a spontaneous media growth since the liberalization of media in 1993 from state owned stations of Radio Uganda and Television. To date, there are over 320 licensed radio stations, 46 televisions, 16 newspapers and numerous online platforms.
However, this pluralism has not yielded equal and equitable diversity in terms of gender ownership, representation and presentation. Studies indicate that only 10% management positions are occupied by women while less than 5% media is owned by women. This is not any different with media training institutions where the enrollment of females is higher than male and yet the numbers reduce at completion rate, newsrooms and female practitioner sustainability in the profession.
Testimonies from female journalists highlight that the unsafe media environment that poses women as soft targets shortens their practice period. Among the insecurities mentioned was sexual harassment, brutality, gender-based discriminatory pay and promotions.
Josephine Namakumbi, a female journalist working with NBS television as a reporter and news anchor, who has experienced violence shared her experience as follows,
“I have been a journalist for 4 years. It has not been easy being a journalist and the fact that I am female. My journalism has not been bad until February 17th, 2021 when I was deployed with my colleagues to cover one of the activities of a Political Party, National Unity Platform (NUP), when they wished to file a petition with United Nations High Commission. On that day, we found many security officers at the UN Human Rights offices but we did not feel scared because it is usually what happens when covering political events involving opposition leaders.
Two motorcades drove around and we thought it was the usual. Two motorcades came back however in a terrible speed and still we thought it was the usual. They jumped out of the car and started chasing people. Out of the blue the commander hit my colleague on the head and we saw blood oozing. So I started running for my life. As I turned around, I saw a colleague with blood on his head. Before I knew it two men were running after me. I had a camera in my hand. I started running with it and that is when my colleagues saw me in a distance and ran back to pick it from him, I held his hand but unfortunately could not get hold of him. I fell down and tried to get up and ran again. I slid and fell down and the man got hold of me and hit me with a baton hard on my back. I could not run any more. I tried to plead with the man that I am media person but instead he demanded that I should leave immediately. I tried to get up and run but I could not because I was in shock, and pain.
My colleagues later took me to hospital, took an x-ray. The body tissue around my waist was smashed! I got treatment but there are other side effects that I am experiencing like my waist and back. The experience was horrible, looking at how I and my colleagues were beaten. When I chose journalism as my profession, I had planned to stay in the practice for 10 to 20 years, but with the violence that is happening, I don’t know if I shall make those years. This has affected the way I work, it’s frustrating. I am scared for my life.”
The impact of a narrowing female journalists presence in newsrooms is beyond the numbers but affecting on the content output by media houses. Absence of a female perspective to a story consequently creates a male dominance of opinion and somewhat souring, insensitive language or misrepresentation thus a gender imbalance witnessed.
Majority of the 11 media outlets engaged in the four-month intervention of encouraging in-house gender responsiveness noted that their newsroom culture encourages that the editorial policies and reporters all are recognizant of gender issues and thereby being sensitive.
John Eremu, the deputy chief editor of New Vision, one of the media engaged, emphasized that the news room culture is to encourage the reporters to always balance their stories by having voices of both men and women.
Way forward
Uganda Media Women’s Association as a gender and media advocate for the past 39 years recognizes that gender sensitivity in media is an integral achievable of collective efforts from all concerned players.
Therefore, from the Gender Media Monitoring research for the past ten years, it was informative that the gender gaps numbered and reported needed deliberate efforts of both self and statutory mechanisms to achieve gender responsiveness in media.
No wonder the Gender Responsive Media Monitoring four-month intervention that has generated media engagements for realizations, critique and positive change within the scope of action time. So what beyond July of this deliberation:
- Sustainability of progressive media content monitoring to encourage increased gender sensitivity among reporters/presenters in media houses
- Increased capacity building of women on media use and appreciation, towards increased visibility and inclusion in media content
- Increased in-house training of journalists on relevance of gender sensitive reporting on individuals, media house and society at large, while knowledgeable on gender interviewing skills
- Adoption and development of specific gender policies within media houses which encourages gender sensitivity within newsrooms
- Uganda Communications Commission, as a regulator ensuring gender responsiveness in content disseminated by media
