Rethinking Role of Media in Elections

Rethinking the role of mass media in elections An essay originally prepared for the Weekend Nation (Malawi) Supplement on Elections Levi Zeleza Manda1 Writing in 1988, Robert Hornik compared mass communication media and social media to a low cost loudspeaker for diffusing policies, laws, and innovations; an accelerator of interaction amongst different peoples, a “legitimator” of development projects and political leadership; a feed-forwarder and a magnifier of ideas and success stories. Much earlier, Jurgen Herbamas had ascribed a public sphere role to the media of mass communication while in the 1970s Paulo Freire saw in the mass communication media a force for gendered popular political conscientisation and empowerment. Mass communication media have also been found to promote what cultivation analysts call symbolic annihilation, and one may add, symbolic amplification. More recently, in 2005 to be precise, Osabuohien Amienyi has forcefully argued that mass communication media need to play the critical role of fostering national integration and respect symbols of nationhood in Africa where tribal or ethnic loyalty often overshadows nationalistic considerations. Of necessity, Amienyi argues, national integration is of precursor of national development. Put simply, mass communication media, which encompass television, radio, newspapers, display advertising, social media, outreach, and social marketing products, can and do play a positive and, sometimes, negative roles in political education and in attaining free and fair elections, which all genuine democratic governance systems strive for. The media, borrowed wisdom holds, can build a politician and destroy one. Indeed, some mass communication media can brighten or darken someone’s image. But most importantly, as Herbamas intimates, today’s media can be a neutral discussion place, a public sphere better and more democratic than the ancient Greek agora. Picture the public sphere as that free place, like a public park, and see in it the goings-on under the Kachere Tree, or at the village court, Bwalo or Mphala, where political debates are moderated, but are left to flow without hindrance. 1 Levi Zeleza Manda (PhD) is a Malawian regular newspaper columnist, blogger, media trainer, researcher, and strategist. Email: admanda2002@yahoo.co.uk Page 1 of 5 Thus, during elections, mass communication media can level the political campaign field by giving all contestants ample and equitable time and enough opportunity to express their ideas. It is up to the public or the potential voter to sift the chaff from the grain. After all, even that proverbial mad man was able to distinguish comedians dressed as warriors from warriors dressed as comedians. Undoubtedly, mass communication media often help voters easily distinguish serious candidates from those who just want to make the ballot paper long and complicated. Then translate Paulo Freire’s conscientisation and empowerment as the mass communication media conducting political and civic education so that voters are aware of what and who to vote for; where and how to vote; when and why they should vote. Translate conscientisation and empowerment further and visualize the mass communication media as moderators of the public sphere urging even reluctant people to go out and vote. Already there are a number of people that feel so disgruntled by our recycled politicians that voter apathy may crown the 2014 tripartite election. Timely conscientisation and empowerment by the mass communication media could address potential voter apathy. The mass communication media should send one strong message to potential voters that by not voting, they are voting for what they do not want. Continue translating conscientisation and empowerment and see it as the role of mass communication media helping the majority of Malawians, particularly those not blessed with Eurocentric literacy, the visually impaired, and the deaf to understand which ballot to slot where during the 2014 tripartite elections. Translate conscientisation and empowerment and imagine the mass communication media prodding the Malawi Electoral Commission, political parties, individual candidates, and NGOs involved in providing civic education to enable Malawians with physical disabilities to vote in dignity by providing easy access to polling booths. Finally, translate conscientisation and empowerment and see Malawian journalists and communicators teaching themselves to practice their much-touted professional neutrality. Now, understand symbolic amplification as the mass media promoting through image embellishment, profile upward adjustment, deification, and decoration of some candidates at the expense of others. Understand symbolic annihilation as the mass media playing down the successes and the potential of some candidates and political parties while playing up only their bad, dark, and ugly side. As Tim Neale, Malawi’s longtime friend and my emeritus partner in the Commonwealth sponsored trainings of MEC election stringers, would have reminded us, the role of the mass communication media prior to, during, and immediately after the announcement of results is to ensure the election campaigns, polling, vote counting and announcement are conducted peacefully, freely, in a timely manner, and without manipulation. Page 2 of 5 To achieve this ideal, mass communication media need to act disinterestedly, treat all candidates fairly, observe news balance, and treat the 2014 tripartite elections as a novel and complex democratic activity that needs serious preparation and close observation. Fairness does not necessarily mean equal treatment in every news stories for all political candidates, for all parties in all regions, all districts and all constituencies and at all rallies every day. Fairness and balance can be achieved if the media houses establish a political campaign and civic education reporting desk and schedule, and ensure the views of one candidate are juxtaposed with those of other candidates in the same story so that the mass communication media are a true public sphere for the debating of ideas, and not personalities. In the rare possibility that the views of one candidate cannot immediately be balanced with those of other candidates and the exigencies of publication demand that the story be published sooner than later, media houses need to do follow up stories, as an obligation, to achieve balance in subsequent editions of radio, television bulletins, newspapers, social and online media. One thing mass communication media need to remember is that appearance in peak time bulletins or on the front pages is worth more than off peak-time and inside-page appearance. Thus who appears where during election period matters and should be considered part of the principles of fairness, balance and equitable treatment of candidates. For purposes of fairness and equitable coverage, peak-time news bulletins and front pages should rotate in terms angles and prominence. The performance of the mass communication media is one of the criteria that international and local election observers use to judge whether or not an election has been free and fair. Except in 1994 when the Malawi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) was answerable to the MEC for electoral coverage, all subsequent elections have been declared free but not fair. This means that the MBC is a major player in Malawi’s elections. Research shows that despite the presence of over thirty private commercial, religious, and community radio stations, the MBC is still the most favoured radio station nationally. Its professionalization is thus non-negotiable; for by MBC electoral coverage performance Malawi’s elections are judged fair or unfair. Since all bona fide Malawians want free and fair elections, ensuring that the MBC desists from biased news coverage is everybody’s responsibility. Even President Joyce Banda agrees that MBC political news coverage needs immediate change. She has repeatedly instructed the MBC to change and accommodate the views of all Malawians of every political persuasion. President Banda’s plea is reminiscent of Presidents Muluzi and Mutharika’s initial call for the MBC to open up to all Page 3 of 5 prominent Malawian political persuasions as they have done to the broadcast of all prominent religious beliefs, languages, businesses, dances, and cultural performances. Take it that Muluzi and Mutharika belong to the past. Does it not surprise you that, today, more than one year after President Banda’s instruction, the MBC has not changed much in terms of political coverage? Why does the MBC seem to defy presidential directives? Opposition parties had the opportunity to change the MBC in 2006 following President Mutharika’s defection from the UDF, which also defected to the opposition. They also have an opportunity here and now. Why are opposition parties not interested in changing the MBC? There are many possible answers. Firstly, politicians enjoy biased reporting both as victims and victimizers. Parties in opposition today expect to use the MBC to castigate those in power today should those in power today lose the 2014 elections. Secondly, politicians do their own research and know that the mass communication media may not be central to one’s success in elections. Otherwise the MCP would have had no MP by now. My analysis of the amount of media coverage (of MBC and others combined) and electoral outcomes from the referendum of 1993 to the parliamentary and presidential elections of 2009 reveals that there is no significant or direct correspondence between media coverage and winning or losing an election. Maybe politicians should take seriously the findings of an empirical field study conducted by Diana Nkhulembe, a former Bachelor of Arts in Journalism student at the Polytechnic, University of Malawi. The said study concluded that tribe/ethnicity, kinship, trust in the ruling party, and belief that a sitting president cannot be dislodged seem to influence voters more than mass communication media coverage. In conclusion, I put it that while the mass media may create awareness about political issues, provide political and civic education, mobilize and motivate people to vote, the role of the media in making and unmaking politicians is limited unless a political candidate or party commits a seismic blunder. A candidate and party’s ideas, incumbency, changing demographics such as gender, age, migration, and ethnic composition, kinship, frequency of contact with and “bribery” of potential voters, and, in Malawi’s peculiar case, regionalism/provincialism, that super-tribe, matter more than a candidate’s presence in the public and private media. It has taken two consecutive defeats for the Republicans to understand why Barak Obama won the presidential contests in the USA when the two major parties had an almost equal media presence and coverage. This is not to say the mass communication media have no effect on Page 4 of 5 voter behaviour. They inform, conscientise, and empower voters. However, theirs is just one of the many factors that influence voting patterns. These include religion, cultural traditions, and beliefs which still define the way Malawians perceive the world. A clever political candidate will thus rethink the role of mass communication in elections and not put all his political campaign eggs in that one political campaign basket, even if that basket be as big, as old and as nationally available as the MBC is. References Amienyi, OP. 2005. Communicating National Integration: Empowering Development in African Countries. Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Limited. Freire, P. 1996. The Pedagogy of the Oppressed. London: Penguin Books. Herbamas, J.1989. The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. Hornik, R.1988. Development Communication: Information, Agriculture, and Nutrition in the Third World. London: Longman. Manda, LZ. 2013. Media in the Political Process. In Patel, N & Svåsand, L (eds) Government and Politics in Malawi, Zomba: Kachere Series, University of Malawi Centre for Social Research, & Chr. Michelsens institutt) Neale, T. 2004. Malawi’s Media: 2004 and Beyond. In Ott, M., Immink, B., Mhango, B., PetersBerries, C. (eds), The Power of the Vote: Malawi’s 2004 parliamentary and Presidential Elections. Zomba: Kachere. Nkhulembe, D. 2009. An investigation of the Influence of the Media during Malawi’s 2009 Parliamentary and Presidential Elections. Unpublished dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the BA (Journalism) degree, Department of Journalism, Polytechnic, University of Malawi. Page 5 of 5