Dar es Salaam. Radio stations across Tanzania performed poorly in promoting candidates’ and citizens’ voices in the November 27, 2024, local government elections, the 2024 Yearbook on Media Quality in Tanzania revealed during its launching ceremony Wednesday.
The study, titled Where Are the Candidates’ and Citizens’ Voices? Scrutiny of Radio Stations’ Coverage of 2024 Local Government Elections in Tanzania, was conducted by the School of Journalism and Mass Communication (SJMC) of the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM).
Its findings show that out of 992 news and programmes reviewed from 35 radio stations across Tanzania, the most used source groups were political parties (37 per cent), followed by the executive government and its agencies (27 per cent), local government authorities (22 per cent), ordinary citizens (20 per cent) and party candidates (13 per cent).
“The radio stations under review covered the candidates and their policies less than other issues,” states the study funded by the Swiss Embassy and the British High Commission in Tanzania. “Yet, media coverage of candidates’ policies allows citizens to make the right choices on election day.”
The findings, presented to key media stakeholders, including heads of newsrooms and representatives from journalism schools and civil society groups, come while Tanzania is preparing for the general election later this year, where media are expected to play a significant role in ensuring effective citizens’ participation in the processes.
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They point out a systemic malady within the country’s news media organisations that every study monitoring media’s behaviour during elections has revealed, signifying a serious issue that stakeholders agree they have to confront to ensure media’s positive role in the democratic processes.
During a discussion that followed the findings’ revelation, key actors in Tanzania’s media landscape confirmed that the problem does not exist in radio stations only but is prominent across other media, including newspapers, TV networks and digital media outlets.
Actors unanimously agreed that there is a need for news media organisations to prioritise candidates’ and citizens’ voices during elections, as failure to do so will make elections less democratic as people won’t be able to make informed choices and decisions.
“One way of achieving that is to make deliberate decisions that the news and other programmes a particular media outlet produces concerning elections feature a candidate’s views as well as citizens’ reaction on how they feel about that given issue,” one contributor suggested during the discussion.
Another issue that stakeholders agreed that they need to confront in the news media organisations is the inclusion of women as sources of news stories and programmes, which report after report has concluded that most newsrooms in Tanzania perform dismally.
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The findings of the study at hand, for example, reveal that most radio stations under review did not prioritise female sources, with 62 per cent of the 992 news and programmes reviewed from 35 radio stations nationwide having zero female sources.
“The inclusion of women – as sources of news – [is] an essential element in news media coverage,” the study admitted. “[However, this] remains a grave concern with no improvement at all.”
As a solution, the study calls for “substantive changes” in media practices and broader legal-political contexts to achieve “meaningful advancements in election reporting and citizen engagement.”
