Statement of the 7th MacBride Round Table on Communication.

Tunis, March 16 - 18, 1995.

The 7th MacBride Roundtable, held in Tunis, was in many ways a journey home to Africa for a movement that owes a great debt to this region. It is to the Algiers Non-Aligned Summit in 1973 that many look for the origins of the struggle for a new and more equitable communication order. Tunisia also was one of the Non-Aligned countries to spearhead the struggle for a new international order in the fields of culture and communication. It was here, twenty years ago, that the first concrete instrument was established, Non-Aligned News Agencies Pool. And it was here that the Non-Aligned Symposium on Information in 1976 articulated its aspirations toward more equitable and fair global communication structures and flows. The venue of the 7th MacBride Round Table therefore offered welcome reminders of the cultural and political movement which led to the UNESCO commissioned report Many Voices, One World, popularly known as the MacBride Report, and indeed of the contribution of the diverse cultures of Africa. Over seventy participants from eighteen countries at the 7th MacBride Round Table, meeting from 16 to 18 March 1995, were the guests of the Tunisian Association of Communication (ATUCOM). Its president, Mustapha Masmoudi, was one of the MacBride commissioners, and participants greatly benefited from his extensive experience and wise leadership.

Africa Faces the Information Highway

The main theme of the meeting was Africa and the Information Superhighway, or the implications of the next generation of information technology for this vast continent. The point of departure for discussion was obvious: as put recently by an African diplomat to the UN General Assembly, "While industrialised countries are already talking about an Information Superhighway, in most of the developing countries that highway has not been paved". There is a strong possibility that much of the African coastline will be ringed by glass fibre cables. But, except for some large cities, the land mass of Africa is likely be untouched by an information highway for a long time to come. More than 70 per cent of Africa's population live in villages with no electricity and no telephone connections, nor are they likely to have them in the foreseeable future. Besides, these villagers have so little spending power that they are of little interest to the big players of the information highway. The highway planners are interested only in Africa's affluent city dwellers who are already in possession of a telecommunication infrastructure, thereby further widening the gap between the rich and poor.

So it is vitally important that the media and political debates on the Information Society do not distract attention from the basic communication needs in Africa, far more mundane but all the more essential for that.

Africa's Communication Agenda

For the Third World and Africa particularly, the Information Superhighway must have a public lane that integrates the various media, including traditional channels, in a way that promotes Africa's development. Thus the communication agenda for Africa that emerged at the MacBride Round Table contrasts sharply with high-level debates and promises emanating from Washington, Brussels and Tokyo:

- Radio, the only affordable mass medium for most people, must be extended, improved in quality and diversified in content, particularly in its educational programmes;

- A more reliable and less expensive telephone network should be established as a matter of urgency and gradually extended to rural areas; an inter-African telecommunication system needs to be developed under the auspices and with the support of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU);

- The current problems caused by the steep increase in paper prices need to be addressed, lest the effects on African education and book production be catastrophic;

- An independent press committed to democratic accountability needs to be strengthened;

- The training and education of journalists in all parts of Africa remain an urgent and ongoing task.

Africa may have lost its 'strategic' significance for the West since the end of superpower rivalry. Now would be the time to show honest and active solidarity with the hard pressed peoples of this continent, starting from their real needs and not from the global strategic needs of the corporate-driven North.

The Role of the Information Superhighway

The Information Society comes into perspective when viewed against these basic communication needs. Yet it would be a mistake for Africa to ignore the possibilities, and risks, of the new global networks. The challenge is to push debate beyond the question of simply gaining access to the Superhighway; to that of defining an Information Society that is relevant to real African needs and building it up from that base. There are ways in which it can complement and reinforce the impact of more traditional communication initiatives addressing basic needs; and it can offer entirely new instruments to many struggling with the many demands of African economic and social development. For instance, existing Internet African services could form a mutual organisation to share information, coordinate services, and collaborate on service extension. Or information networks could be used to gather and distribution international market and trading information, to support local cooperatives and reduce the slice of the commercial intermediaries based usually in the North.

The rural dimension of African society, encompassing 70% of the population, must also be to the forefront. Reaching out to rural communities to enhance dialogue and favour access to information, using appropriate techniques and technologies (not necessarily the most advanced), must be a goal of development projects, whether sponsored by international organisations, NGOs, governments or the private sector,

The opening for such refocusing of the Information Society on real needs is found in pledges to public access, universal service and development in the South, contained in government and intergovernmental statements. The G7 Summit in Brussels in February 1995 commits its participating governments to "promoting universal service to ensure opportunities for all to participate" and to "encouraging the dialogue on worldwide cooperation" such that industrialised countries will work towards the participation of developing countries in the Global Information Society.

Of course, significant measures to achieve these worthy aims are nowhere to be found in the fine print, where common concrete actions for the Information Society are put forward. The direct implication throughout is that their fate will lie with liberalised markets and deregulated and privatised industries, as the motive force and main instruments of change.

Yet these are not only insufficient: many observers are concerned that market forces, left unfettered, will significantly increase the gap between the have's and the have-not's. If laudable words are to translate into positive action that seriously addresses shortcomings in the proposed implementation of the Global Information Society, then much work remains to be done. If such promises are left unfulfilled, if powerful countries are not forced to honour their commitments, then calls for universal access and development priorities are likely to diminish to inaudible whispers under the din of 'market realities' and 'trickle-down' benefits. A leader article in the Economist magazine recently offered an offhand dismissal of those calling for a more equitable interpretation of the Information Society: "There is already a clamour to turn access to cyberspace into another "entitlement"' . When that clamour becomes too loud to ignore, then maybe some of the promissory notes will be called in and paid up.

With these issues in mind, the Round Table issued a specific call to action in relation to the development of the information society in Africa. This follows as the second part of this Statement.

Women Must be Heard

The Tunis Round Table also discussed the roles of women and grassroots organisations for the strengthening of democracy in Africa and elsewhere. The democratic process depends on a viable civil society, organised in citizens' groups, social movements, human rights' and women's organisations. Democracy declines and may disintegrate when its processes are usurped by politicians and their parties - as has been demonstrated in some parts of Africa and elsewhere. In many cases the mass media systems have accelerated the decline, primarily the agents of government or politicians rather than the voice of civil society as a whole. Women's organisations in particular must make themselves heard by pressuring the mass media and/or by finding a voice of their own in alternative media.

The recent Social Summit in Copenhagen heard that 70% of the world's poor are women , and the central role of women in struggling to survive poverty and nurture new generations is finally receiving some recognition. In relation to the empowerment of women in the communication field, the Round Table emphasised the need to strengthen efforts already underway and to expand their role, inter alia, through access to the media and through participation in the management and operation of newspapers and radio stations in both urban and rural areas. In the sphere of traditional communication, attention was drawn to the importance of folk theatre, story tellers, choirs: their role is pivotal in promoting active communication centred on cultural values.

A new agenda is also being constructed by women on the vital issue of communication technology, covering such topics as the possibility of gender discrimination built into the very conceptualisation of communication technology; the hierarchical structure and binary logic of informatics, laden with gender specific values; and a critique of information technology built upon a larger epistemological critique of enlightenment notions of progress and rationality embodied in science and technology.

Journalists in Situations of Violence and War

Sean MacBride was especially concerned with the danger faced by journalists in their work. The loss of journalists' lives in the last few years has shown the need for better protection in situations of violent conflicts. - 1994 was the worst year on record with the killing of 122 reporters, photographers and editors while carrying out their work . The International Red Cross and other human rights organisations, and above all governments and authorities directly involved in such conflicts, must find new means and ways of securing greater safety for journalists. Such considerations, however, should be supplemented by efforts of journalists and news gathering organisations towards more honesty and fairness in war reporting.

* * * The Tunis Round Table referred to one of the oldest documents on international communication, namely the UNESCO Declaration of 1978 on Fundamental Principles concerning the contribution of the Mass Media in strengthening Peace and International Understanding, to the Promotion of Human Rights, and to countering Racialism, Apartheid and Incitement to War. While Apartheid has now officially been abolished, thanks to the biggest social movement of the last two decades, all other issues of the UNESCO Declaration remain unresolved. They remain a responsibility of the mass media for years to come.

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Countries Present at Round Table

Participants came from 18 countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Cameroon, Canada, Egypt, France, Finland, Ireland, Italy, Kenya, Nigeria,.South Africa, South Korea, Spain, United Kingdom, Tunisia, USA, Zimbabwe. There were 44 participants from Tunisia, and 30 from outside.

New Steering Committee

The new Steering Committee, including alternates, comprises: Mustapha Masmoudi (Tunis, Chair), Rick Vincent (USA, Vice-Chair), Sean O'Siochru (Ireland, Vice-Chair and Treasurer), Awatef El Rahman (Egypt) and Francis Wete (Cameroon), Floragnel Rosario-Braid (Philippines) and Daeho Kim (South Korea), Kerric Harvey (USA) and Colleen Roach (USA), Wolfgang Kleinwaechter (Germany) and Alain Ambrosi (Canada), Kaarle Nordenstreng (Finland) and Cees Hamelink (Netherlands), Mike Traber (UK) and Predip Thomas (UK). The Auditing Committee comprises: Marc Raboy, Stanford Mukasa and Andrea Kavanaugh.

Tunis, Tunisia, 1995

Statement by Ngoni Sengwe, Deputy Permanent Representative Permanent Mission of Zimbabwe to the UN, in the Special Political and Decolonisation Committee, 24th October 1994.

The Economist, 25th February 1995 . Reported in the New York Times, March 6, 1994.

US Committee to Protect Journalists, New York Times, 7th February 1994.

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