Ntsoaki Motaung
The Lesotho Communications Authority (LCA) raised a concern about the level of professionalism of media in the country.
As a result, LCA together with Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Lesotho held a capacity building workshop this week in Maseru on Ethics, Professional Reporting, New Media Technologies and Gender Sensitive Reporting.
Acting LCA Manager Nizaam Goolom said the idea of holding the workshop was born from LCA’s concern regarding the high volumes of complains that have been registered with the authority this year alone.
He stated that, the trend of the complaints indicates that there is a vacuum between what can be regarded professional reporting on one hand and gossip on the other.
“This concern is further dough tailed in the media reforms report. There is a clear public outcry that our media does not operate within the confines of the professionalism and mostly fail to adhere to the professional penates of reporting,†he said.
He indicated that LCA is also concerned about lack of professionalism in handling gender and national interest issues amongst others.
“We acknowledge that there are underlying factors that cause our media to behave this way, notably low salaries and ownership and control patterns. It however our understanding that the fundamental challenges lie in lack of understanding what is acceptable and what I not acceptable,†he said.
Meanwhile, Keketso Lawrence one of the facilitatiors shared the same sentiments with the LCA boss and said there are many complaints filled with LCA because journalists have lost their responsibility.
He indicated that, news readers and consumers complain that journalist nowadays do not go in-depth to a story leaving people with a lot of questions or even leave the story unbalanced.
Lawrence stated that, journalist end up losing their integrity or feel they are not recognized for the work they do because they are lazy.
“Journalists lose their integrity because they look for benefits sometimes. Benefiting from the story makes it difficult for them to take control of their story. Because of the benefits, they are unable to correct their sources even when they can see or hear that the source is out of conduct. They report on what the source wants not what the facts say,†he said.
