By: Nyima Sillah
In their quest to promote national development through informing and educating the masses, veteran journalistscum top media officials gave a review of the Gambian Media’s activities in 2023 regarding the achievements made, challenges, and expectations in 2024 among others.
The co-publisher of the Point, Mr. Pap Saine, said newspapers or journalism in the Gambia had made significant progress going with fierce competition, adding the competition motivated them to work harder which is very good. “It was my rounding up of the year that despite the consequences we are facing, we are doing our best to meet the challenge by accomplishing an award for the nation to play a key role.’’
The veteran Journalist discloses that it’s not an easy task to run a newspaper because printing materials are very expensive but because of commitment and dedication they are doing their best to make sure they play a key role in society by promoting democracy, good governance, respect of human rights and rule of law is our duty as journalists.
“Despite challenges, the media still tries to inform and educate the public. As journalists we should always be accurate and impartial to do our job without fear or favor,” Mr.Saine told The Voice in an exclusiveinterview.
He points out that one of the major challenges of the print media is the rising cost of printing, saying all the printing materials are expensive and every two, or three months the price increases because of the foreign exchange.
“Another challenge is that many of our advertisers in the government departments didn’t pay at the upfront and it takes time before we have the money to pay our salaries, and other things like the printing materials. I’m appealing to the government to work with media cordially we are development partners we should work together for the development of the interest of the nation,” Saine said. He added: “We are not enemies but we are partners we should open a new page of corporation, support each other because without government, it will harm our production and advertisement which is playing a key role in our financial resources.”
He opined that the government should help the press by advertising without detention to any media house, saying the entire media house should be equal in democracy. “Accept criticism. We are in a democratic season so people should adore the press about the work they are doing for the society.”
The managing editor of the Foroyaa newspaper, Samuel Sarr, for his part, said there had been a lot of developments in the media in 2023. “We can say that a lot has changed. People are now speaking their minds. That is expanding.”
“We have to take a step forward as the president had initially promised when he was elected in 2016 thatfree speech would no longer be an offense. He should go ahead with that. I meant those provisions. I believe at the moment there is some sort of trust in the sense that people are still speaking out but it seems the target may have been certain individuals and it doesn’t seem that further steps will be taken apart from the MadiJobarteh case.” He suggested Madi’s case be dropped.
Mr. Sarr also explains that operating print media is complex as it requires a lot of expenditure. The daily expenses spike and if it continues there will be continuous problems in the operation of print media.
“The problem is for the government to make concessions so that the newspapers can be able to do their work very effectively. We say we live in an electronic age. But in the Gambia, many people rely very much on newspapers and it has the advantage of permanence that you can get it at any time you go to the archives but finance is our main challenge.”
“We should continue to endure and put our efforts together. That’s the newspaper proprietors to ensure that we achieve our goal of serving as a main source of information. That’s what we are,’’ Mr., Sarremphasized. Adding: ‘’All these radio stations are secured, relying on the newspapers to get the use. So we do the expenditure. We pay our staff to go and get the news. We have other ancillary staff who areinvolved. But at the end of the day, you just have your radio station and just read the newspapers, and everybody tunes in and gets the information. So they should be grateful to us.”
Furthermore, the manager of King FM Radio, BabouCeesay, added his voice to the chorus that it is difficult to run media house in the Gambia, especially radio.
“This year we have witnessed a little bit of drop-down of radio revenues the way they we’re earning revenues has dropped. I don’t know the cost of it but we have the experience that this year is very hard. Everything is increasing the cash power is increasing especially in that area of the media because it consumes cash power’s electricity which is our main challenge right now and the tax also is very costly.”
The King FM Manager lamented that there is a huge gap comparing the amount of tax they paid and the revenues that they are earning as radio operators. “In terms of making profits, we are not making profits as expected,” Mr. Ceesay concluded. Adama Nyangand Fatoumata Baldeh contributed to the story.