"Participation Builds Unity"
"MADE IN AFRICA - FOR AFRICA"
"Participation Builds Unity"
"MADE IN AFRICA - FOR AFRICA"
PRESENTS
REPORT GOOD STORIES ABOUT AFRICA
BuaNews
MAY 2006
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South Africa
Report the good stories about Africa: international reporters told
(South Africa) Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka has called on the international media to stop portraying Africa in a bad light but to report on the good stories that are emerging on the continent.
She was addressing the International Press Institute's (IPI) World Congress and the 55th General Assembly in Scotland yesterday as part of her three-day working visit to the United Kingdom.
The gathering has brought together editors, publishers and leading journalists from around the world to debate and discuss a range of issues that concern all those who support IPI's core purpose – to further and safeguard press freedom worldwide.
The deputy president told the gathering that newspaper editors and the media played a "crucial role in ensuring success or failure in Africa’s quest to hold the world stage".
And she emphasised the importance of accurate reporting to the western editors, saying editors had been making choices on how they saw Africa.
" …they have tended to see the dark side of Africa.
She said while Africa still faced a number of challenges, there was a need to “dispose” of the mindset that Africa was a hopeless continent.
The deputy president pointed out that out of 54 countries in Africa, only five were currently experiencing conflict.
"Yet the 49 countries are easily compromised by failure to acknowledge peace in most countries and note success of individual nations. The decline of numbers of African refugees and refugees in general as indicated by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is very welcomed and proof of progress," she said.
Brain drain is another problem that was hampering success in developing economies and solutions to this must be found, Ms Mlambo-Ngcuka added.
"We also need to entice the many skilled Africans who are in the Diaspora, which of course means we must incentivise them. It would be naïve to think we can control mobility of skilled personnel but a 'do nothing' scenario is also untenable. We would urge a collaborative approach between the rich and poor countries."
The deputy president also spoke about a number of Africa–wide initiatives that illustrated how Africa was developing and overcoming its problems.
These include the African Peer Review Mechanism through which African countries review one another on wide ranging subjects such as governance, peace and stability, human rights and economic development as well as Nepad and its initiatives, which provide a mechanism for African countries to collaborate rather than compete against themselves.
South Africa has adopted the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative (ASGISA) in response to its specific socio-economic challenges, which include massive infrastructure investment by the state to address overstretched infrastructure that cannot cope with levels of growth which averaged 4.5 percent of GDP in 2005.
ASGISA also focuses on a drive for skills development focusing on priority and scarce skills for South Africa's needs; sector development which targets high potential growth sectors where South Africa has a competitive edge such as tourism as well as improving the 'second economy’ – which is those who are marginalised in society.
Other interventions target Small Micro and Medium Enterprises (SMMEs) as well as youth and women.
BuaNews
"Hence I would like us to talk about “re-branding” Africa, consistent with the strides made by individual countries and by the continent as a whole, through [the News Partnership for Africa's Development] NEPAD and the African Union [AU]."
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