Mweetwa and statutory media regulation

By Daily Revelation Editor

Information minister Cornelius Mweetwa says he will not retract the recent statement he made in Parliament that the government would be left with no choice, but to come up with statutory regulation of the media.

“We expect MISA that when a media house has misconducted itself, the same way The Mast misconducted itself, the same way KBN misconduct itself, they should be the first to render advice so that if they want to talk to us, they will stand on some higher moral grounds,” said Mweetwa said. “Let me place on record therefore, that I am not retracting the statement I made, with this kind of misconduct by some, a few media houses like The Mast Newspaper.”

From the outset, we wish to state our opposition to the one held by the information minister. While acknowledging that there are several ills in the manner the media is operating, and some of the ills will continue, even with the best intentions, statutory regulation of the media is not the way to go.

If Mweetwa feels too strongly about wanting to muzzle the media on account of the feelings he has with certain media organisations, he should handle that with the media organisations involved rather than trying to use the same as a pretext for his government to introduce media statutory regulation.

And what will Mweetwa even benefit if his government were to go ahead with the same regulation, which would only amount to reducing the media houses to mere government mouthpieces as the government seeks to control the flow of information. The only result would be a situation where the media will now live in this same echo chamber some of those in government have gotten accustomed to, where Mweetwa will want to listen to his voice 24/7. Despite its many weaknesses, society benefits more from a media that is independent and self-regulating, as opposed to one which is statutorily regulated in order to operate under the dictates of the government. In such a scenario, divergence of opinions becomes a pipedream. Such a system does not guarantee the effective role of the media as the fifth estate, in the provision of effective checks and balances, and holding the powerful accountable.

Mweetwa must come to terms with the fact that not all the media houses will operate in the same echo chamber manner he wishes them to operate. We know that the media is not perfect, and shall never be, as the media institutions are operated by human beings who are prone to error. But rather than improving the media operations, Mweetwa will actually worsen them more if he proceeds with his threat. It is always better to engage than always wanting to come up with laws to address any given situation.

If he feels strongly against some media houses, there are a lot of applicable laws in our statute books for redress. We are sure that he is confident in the laws, courts and other systems we have in this country to address all the ills he perceives in the media organisations he has issues with.