Government Subvention Of SLAJ Has Nothing To Do With Accountable Journalism

The Sierra Leone Association of Journalists (SLAJ) in a press release dated 22nd July, 2024 confirmed the receiving of Government Subvention for 2023 and 2024. A total of One Million Five Hundred Thousand new Leones was received by the association as confirmed in the press release signed by the Secretary General Alhaji Manika Kamara.

“The annual government subvention was a proclamation by His Excellency President Julius Maada Bio in 2018 to support the operations of SLAJ as the independent umbrella body for the media in Sierra Leone as part of his commitment to press freedom in the country,” according to the release.

It is also important to note that the said subvention is strictly for SLAJ to ‘administer the annual subvention, which is allocated to its national and regional offices, established Committees, affiliate bodies, and sub bodies’, and not to be shared among journalists which has been the popular belief of the public.

For obvious reasons, some people including opposition media are misconstruing the genuine intention of President Bio to support the association as a ploy to silence critical journalists or media institutions in the country, for they see no way SLAJ can adequately hold the government accountable and responsible to the people of Sierra Leone.

It is worth noting that SLAJ is not a media house but an institution that was established to advocate for the well-being of journalists and be a bridge between government and the media landscape in the country and nothing else.

Journalism is a crucial profession and many a time, journalists have been found wanting by the law in their call of duty.
SLAJ as an umbrella body has been coming to the aid of its members which wouldn’t have been possible had it not been in existence.

Section 11 of the 1991 Constitution mandate the press, and other agencies of the mass media to hold the fundamental objectives of the Constitution at all times and to highlight the responsibility and accountability of the government to the people of Sierra Leone.

“To me, SLAJ accepting money from the government is a bad idea as the media is the only institution that can hold the government accountable while informing the public about the good and bad policies of the government. SLAJ needs to go back to the discussion table and have a rethink. The media in Sierra Leone is poor, media houses solely depend on adverts to survive. The government through its ministries department and agencies is the biggest advertisers in the country. So, you see that most media houses don’t publish the negative sides of the government because they fear losing adverts. It is a business and no one wants to run a business without profit. So if the government has successfully stifled some media houses through advert, their next objective is to use subvention to do the same to SLAJ,”
a veteran journalist cautioned.

Devoid of all prejudices, the media landscape has come of ages and professional transformation which makes it hard to be controlled or influenced by anyone or government.

Before the subvention, SLAJ as a body has been constrained financially in running the affairs of the body and what President Bio continues to do is to respond to the cry of the Executive which makes less than 3% of the journalists community in Sierra Leone.

It is laughable to believe that such a minute number can influence the operation and work of the entire media landscape through government subvention.

If President Bio had wanted to limit the power of the press , his government wouldn’t have taken the bold step to repeal the Criminal Libel law which was limiting the work of critical journalists.

With the expunged criminal libel law, journalists can practice their profession without fear of being arbitrarily arrested and detained as was happening before.

Notably, journalists have been very critical and vocal in holding the government to account as before.

According to the former Minister of Information and present Minister of Labor, Mohamed Rado Swarray, President Bio has been the most vilified presidential candidate and president in Sierra Leone’s history.
But he has been very calm and professional in dealing with the media in the face of strong criticism.

The government of President Bio took the bold step to expunge Part Five of the Public Order Act.
The detention and jailing of journalists has drastically reduced even though journalist have been very critical of his administration.

Journalists freely critique and engage the President even on his social media pages without fear of arbitrary arrest or detention.

Yes, the subvention of SLAJ is timely and there are lots of challenges in the media landscape, but that has not eroded the standard of journalism in Sierra Leone as more media houses keep sprouting on a daily basis.

The Government subvention to SLAJ must be taken in good fate as there has never been a press release or a call from SLAJ for its members to be lenient with the government of the day.
Even when some of its members come under threat or attack, SLAJ has been the first to condemn the government or the institution in question and call for the protection of journalists devoid of what the individual might have done.
The association is on record to have condemned even the security forces for their heavy handedness in handling some cases that have to do with the public.
This shows the independence, free, fair and credible nature of the association.
However, freedom of expression is not a recipe for freedom of abuse.