Recently various media
published/broadcast that Ethiopia has been making efforts
to jam the Voice of America Amharic Service. Some
remarked that jamming is fair
as that media disseminates unbalanced and conflict
aggravating contents for
years. On the contrary, others argued that jamming is
violating the freedom of
press. However, the bone of contention is paying
attention to the grounds
substantiating each argument. In this regard, it is crucial to
bring the
background of the Amharic service of VOA into view so that
readers could either
agree or disagree.
The Americans people show no
difference at their national interests, and neither
do political parties, the government, and security
bodies. The media also sets
its agenda in line with that. All speak one word. A typical example for
this
could be the campaign against al-Qaeda. The media played
greater role in
influencing the international community that persuaded them to
condemn the
terrorist attack in the USA.
So did the Amharic Service of VOA.
Of course, no one complained
VOA Amharic Service for that deed as it is the
responsibility of any responsible media to work in minimizing
harms. However,
VOA Amharic Service cares
little for people in the developing countries in
general and Ethiopia in particular; in other words, the
attention and care given
to the welfare of the people in the developed
countries is quite different from
the attention to the welfare of people in developing
nations.
It is possible to say that
media is fighting terrorism at a partial level as it
has been encouraging the reorganizing of terrorists in
other countries like
Ethiopia. The stance of American media towards the
terrorist groups in Ethiopia
is so annoying. The ample coverage about Ginbot 7, OLF and other terrorist
groups describing them as freedom fighters while the
groups were burning
schools, murdering civilians, bombarding hotels and other
institution has been
done either on purpose to create havoc or due to
ignorance of their terrorist
activities at home.
If that is the case, what else
has al-Qaeda done? There mightn’t be any error if
one innocently conclude that Bin Laden is a freedom
fighter. But we, Ethiopians,
don’t think that way. We need American media in
particular and other
international media in general to against terrorists of all
sorts. However,
their reports should be balanced, accurate and credible.
But they failed to do
so. All of the reports by that media focus to
disintegrate the country and lead
its people to unceasing conflict. According to Mimi Sebhat, the ex-staff of the
VOA Amharic service, every
report through that media about Ethiopia is usually
made on purpose.
She told “Awra
Amba” Newspaper that most of the journalist working
in the
American media left their
country due to either political or legal cases. As a
result, they usually report anything at an exaggerated
extent. No one worries
about social responsibility that is why many allegations
from different
countries came to America.
Although many Ethiopians argue
that VOA Amharic Service has to be jammed if
possible today, some media including VOA itself argued
jamming this media
violates the freedom of the press and the rights of the
people for information.
The argument lacks logical
reasoning. Freedom of expression isn’t a freedom
given to either the media or the practitioners. The relevance between freedom
of expression and media is the fact that media serves
as an outlet for free
ideas of the public to flow. Therefore, it is the people
who have freedom of
expression not the biased journalist of any media who wanted
to speak for the
people against their interest.
From this point of view, it is
the VOA Amharic Service that has been violating
the voice of its target audience, the Ethiopian people.
It has been violating
the rights of the people to live in harmony, to respect
one another and to
strengthen their unity. As a result, it has little
contribution in harm
minimization despite what its Charter and Editorial Policy
emphasized.
The Charter of Voice of America
was drafted in 1960 and signed into public law
94/350 on 12th of July,
1976. Theoretically, the principles
governing Voice of
America broadcast include
serving as a consistently reliable and authoritative
source of news, which are accurate, objective and
comprehensive. But
practically, none of these has carried out. They simply
remained in black and
whites.
In a survey made using sample
stories of the Voice of America Amharic Service
transmitted in six months time, March 01- August 30, 2008,
entitled as “The
Impact of International Media
in Ethiopian development” the negative impact of
VOA Amharic Service overweighs
its constructive consequences. In the survey, 263
reports about Ethiopia broadcast by VOA Amharic service.
These stories have
monitored and sorted according to their impacts. Negative and
affirmative within
three basic content categories: political, economic and
social.
Of the total 263 stories, only
111(42.21%) are related to development stories
with nearly a fair criticism. The majority of the
stories, 152(57.79%) are
fabrications with negative consequences. Out of the total 152 negative coverage
116(76.32%) are political
issues whereas 1 (0.66%) and 35 (23.03%) of them are
economic and social respectively. Of course, this is at the
normal condition.
Had it been during time of
conflict or election one can imagine how VOA Amharic
Service would be damaging.
The Voice of America Amharic
Service is much concerned about the politics in
Ethiopia. It’s less interested
either in social or economic issues of the
country. Most of its
coverage’s are about opposition parties, terrorist groups
attempting to attack Ethiopians and disrupt the country’s
peace. It has been
distorting the image of the country with biased, inaccurate
and unbalanced
stories.
However, its role in promoting
efforts made to bring the integrity of the people
of Ethiopia is inconsiderable. Neither did it cover a single developmental
story although there are one hundred and one positive
stories. Neither is any
report concerning efforts to reduce poverty, ensure
sustainable economic
development and strengthen democracy in the country. Rather, it
has been working
to escalate conflicts and tension in Ethiopia since
its establishment although
the worst came after the coming of the EPRDF into
power. This period is the time
when the people of Ethiopia began to see light at the
end of the tunnel. VOA
Amharic Service has been
striving to darken that light in collaboration with the
US Human Rights, a few
individuals from the American Senate and terrorist groups
targeting Ethiopia.
Now that the jamming of VOA
Amharic Service has become a big issue of discussion
although different jamming made by other countries including
America itself. For
instance, no media focuses on the jamming of the profile of
Chinese Companies by
the Americans.
But developing countries are usually criticized of whatever
measures they take to minimize what they believed causes
harms to their people.
Their efforts to protect their
people from harms are usually misunderstood by
the developed countries, international organizations
and opposition political
parties in developing countries.
However, there were instances even
in America that different media were jammed.
Radio Venceremos
is a typical example for this case. Radio Venceremos
was being
jammed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), which is
an intelligence agency
of the United States of America with responsibility of
caring the national
security, according to available documents. Jamming of foreign radio broadcast
stations has often been used in wartime and in tense
relations to prevent
citizens from fabricated and confusing stories. Different
countries have
experienced jamming. America, Germany, Israel, Cuba, Iraq,
Iran, China, North
and South Korea are some among many.
Although most of the media
covered the story only from one side, without any
pertinent reasons for the need to jam it, the jamming prevent
people from harms
However, various wrong
assumptions have forwarded. One of the wrong assumptions
is that many people including journalist thought
freedom of expression is a
freedom given to the media not to the public. As a result,
they argued that
jamming VOA Amharic Service indicates violating freedom of
expression. However,
freedom of expression is a freedom given to the people.
Why is it crucial for VOA to
highly focus on the negative issues than the
various positive developments in the Country? Why does it
focusing on the
Ethiopian
politics than the social and economic issues? The answer should come
form VOA itself but one can logically deduce that VOA
Amharic Service has
already set its agenda to challenge the stability and peace
in Ethiopia.
The survey indicated that its
economic coverage is only 1 (0.66%). It is a piece
of piss to imagine how that media failed to serve the
public. Economy is the
crucial question of the people in developing
countries. If VOA Amharic Service
is to responsibly serve its audience, those economic
stories could make much
interest to Ethiopians than any other news stories. They
could make meanings to
Ethiopians because they were suffering
of artificial and manmade problems for
years.
Many political analysts argue
that VOA has aimed at retarding the movement of
the country towards the reduction of poverty and
realization of sustainable
development. It has been
showing little inclination to play its media role in
poverty alleviation and harm minimization for the past
twenty years.
We Ethiopians appreciate the
attention given to us and our country by the VOA.
However, we are very much
disappointed that nearly all of its report coverage
lack social responsibility and care to the people of
Ethiopia. Besides, its
stories are destructive and baseless. If there are any
reports on real
situations, they are reported either in a much distorted way
or with much
exaggeration and a high tone of conflict inciting. In this
regard, the programs
and coverage of VOA Amharic Service failed to watch out
the need of its target
audience.
However, the Ethiopian people
have their own priorities. They need to
have
better living condition, better health and education
services which the VOA
Amharic Service failed to pay
attention to. They also need peace,
unity,
development, good governance and democracy.
There are various development
programs in Ethiopia. Some of them are undertaking
with the collaboration of development partners from the
developed world
including the USA. No single development story was reported
as it is, if any it
is reported in what others want to be. If VOA Amharic Service is simply to
concentrate on the negative issues putting aside all the
progressive stories, it
is no more a public media but a media pressurizing
issues to bring havoc. The
media failed to respect even the charts and editorial
policy to reach the public
with accurate, balanced and objective stories.
There are some terrorist groups
that burned schools, murdered civilians and
bombarded hotels, though our buildings are not as big as the
American twins, so
America should struggle
that. The so called Ginbot
7 is a terrorist group
responsible for the death of many innocents. It is also
responsible for the
failed attempts to destroy the Tekeze
Hydroelectric Power dam. However, America
has become a safe heaven for
the terrorists aimed to disrupt Ethiopia’s
development. Unless America and its allies revised their
position in this
regard, they could, by no means, prevent themselves from
terrorist attacks. The
reason is quite clear.
Those terrorist harbored in America have serious links
with international terrorist groups like al-Qaeda.
VOA Amharic Service Amharic
Service is partially fighting terrorism. It targets
against those terrorists who have aimed at America and its
allies. It supports
those terrorists targeting other countries. This is not the right truck to
fight terrorism effectively. America and the American
media including the
Amharic Service should condemn
all sorts of terrorism.
The Amharic Service of Voice of
America has been also serving as an instrument
for Ginbot 7, OLF and other
terrorist groups attacking Ethiopia.
That was not
the only thing that VOA Amharic Service has been doing.
It has been covering
reports that aimed at escalating conflict, maximizing harms
and dividing the
people into antagonistic groups. It has been aggravating
everything ill and
painful to Ethiopians.
For that reason, no one with healthy mind opposes its
jamming. But the people of Ethiopia have a question
further. VOA Amharic Service
should be alleged for its destructive and genocidal media
coverage for more than
two decades. Therefore, there shouldn’t be any more
silence while that
irresponsible media has been distorting the image of the country
and igniting
fire among Ethiopians.