Tips on how to handle freedom of expression to your benefit when in authority…from Andrew Sesinyi

It is a lot easier, and more beneficial to grant press freedom than to restrict it; when people, feel free to express themselves, it exhausts your critics and fills your supporters with a great deal of pride.

When you suppress press freedom, not only do you give amplification to the volume of empty vessels, but you become also a source of embarrassment to your supporters.

People want to be able to give support to their chosen principals in an atmosphere of freedom so that they can have living verification of the correctness of their choice. Critics wane and wander aimlessly in an environment where their freedom of expression is not only guaranteed but facilitated.

Your most successful enemies will be those to whom your supporters cannot provide tangible evidence that they are wrong- that comes when you limit their freedom, or cause an environment in which your critics cannot be heard by your supporters. To strengthen your support base is to empower your supporters as your best spokespersons by placing your potent messages in juxtaposition with the criticism of your opponents.  Your propensity to hear and let others hear your critics gives weight to your facts. Facts on their own do not build a person. Perceptions do, and perceptions are a deeply emotive abstract phenomenon that is promoted largely by an atmosphere of freedom.

You are only on the right when your supporters wholly believe that you are fair, tolerant, confident and hence able to defend and uphold their integrity. Factions in your own front are created by the atmosphere you create to engage your critics. If your critics can speak themselves hoarse, your front will not be a haven for gossip among your supporters. It is in the nature of the human being to doubt oneself, to question one’s position and choice of allegiance. To fortify your defences, you must exist in a transparent atmosphere, where you and your supporters can prove that you harbour no malice.

Tinkering with media freedom when you are in a position of authority wears out the trust and confidence fibre of your supporters. There will always be a little voice in your supporter that wants to protect those that you may be seen to be prejudiced against. If you use your power to silence your critics, the little voices among your supporters will grow into a cacophony that eventually benefits your opponents.

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On videoTips on how to handle freedom of expression to your benefit when in authority…

It is a lot easier, and more beneficial to grant press freedom than to restrict it; when people, feel free to express themselves, it exhausts your critics and fills your supporters with a great deal of pride.

When you suppress press freedom, not only do you give amplification to the volume of empty vessels, but you become also a source of embarrassment to your supporters.

People want to be able to give support to their chosen principals in an atmosphere of freedom so that they can have living verification of the correctness of their choice. Critics wane and wander aimlessly in an environment where their freedom of expression is not only guaranteed but facilitated.

Your most successful enemies will be those to whom your supporters cannot provide tangible evidence that they are wrong- that comes when you limit their freedom, or cause an environment in which your critics cannot be heard by your supporters. To strengthen your support base is to empower your supporters as your best spokespersons by placing your potent messages in juxtaposition with the criticism of your opponents.  Your propensity to hear and let others hear your critics gives weight to your facts. Facts on their own do not build a person. Perceptions do, and perceptions are a deeply emotive abstract phenomenon that is promoted largely by an atmosphere of freedom.

You are only on the right when your supporters wholly believe that you are fair, tolerant, confident and hence able to defend and uphold their integrity. Factions in your own front are created by the atmosphere you create to engage your critics. If your critics can speak themselves hoarse, your front will not be a haven for gossip among your supporters. It is in the nature of the human being to doubt oneself, to question one’s position and choice of allegiance. To fortify your defences, you must exist in a transparent atmosphere, where you and your supporters can prove that you harbour no malice.

Tinkering with media freedom when you are in a position of authority wears out the trust and confidence fibre of your supporters. There will always be a little voice in your supporter that wants to protect those that you may be seen to be prejudiced against. If you use your power to silence your critics, the little voices among your supporters will grow into a cacophony that eventually benefits your opponents.

-       I’m Andrew |Sesinyi

I WOKE UP AT 2:30 AM, TROUBLED, AND HAD TO WRITE THIS… IN DEFENSE OF MEDIA

If state media, who are supposed to be public media, play their proper role of informing the nation objectively- with balance and fair play- there would be no need for recent commentators to be concerned about the prominence of allegedly unfair private media reports.

The state media have the widest circulation and broadest reach that cover virtually the entire country. It is a bizarre development that there should be rising anti-private media activists who complain of private media unfairness without addressing the credibility complexion and fair play of the largest information source in the country, the state media.

Audiences and readers resort to alternative sources of information when the establishment or main media channels such as state media, fail to provide information that reflects opinions of all the constituent groups and players in society. Bias breeds distrust and loss of clientele.

It is presumed that the latest complaints about private media reports are an indication that there is a move towards refurbishment of the editorial responsibilities of the state media to ensure that the public receives balanced reports and objective reflections of the expressions arising from public debate.

If, however, it is maintained that the sole responsibility of state media is to report some viewpoints to the exclusion of other properly constituted views, it should not be surprising that more and more people will continue listening to and reading private media reports, no matter how incorrect these may be. Notably, unlike state media, private media operate on poorly trained and weak facility status and should be thus expected to have grave shortcomings. That is all the more reason why the state media should play the objective role of a balanced policy reflection of opinions and observations by all key players in our society.

State media have previously discharged balanced, objective and credible services to the public through publication and broadcast of fairly constituted articles and programmes. This was done without departing from the state media role of promoting state policy and development priorities. This attitude of fair play should be reverted to by state media.

We have expressed before that single stream communication affects media credibility and naturally redirects audiences and readers to alternative sources of information, no matter how poorly presented the latter may be. A two way flow of information gives credence to media and captures audiences with enhanced credibility ratings, audience loyalty and reduced diversion of the public towards unfair sources of information. That is why in other countries where, democracy did not thrive, as it does in Botswana, all the cornucopia of state-owned propaganda media establishments to influence public opinion failed abysmally.

Audiences are a natural, scientific and unpretentious virtual entity. Their natural instincts and inclinations are to receive and process only balanced, two-way flow of processes of information. If state media package information in this manner, the public will rarely be distracted towards other sources of the same type of information. No matter how huge and articulate the sermons are against private media, public reception and reaction to information will always be in the framework of their make-up as people. Unless we provide balance, we can only increase dissent- that is a proven communications fact.

Meanwhile, the trials and tribulations of the private media should continue to be seen as a phenomenon that is consistent with the trials and tribulations of our growing democracy; and we can help productively by enhancing good quality information packages by state media rather than lambasting buddying media houses in their nascent stages.

Let us return to the times when there was little to no private media and reflect on how state media filled the vacuum to present balanced information packages that elevated Botswana’s democracy ratings even during the worst of times. State media of the time were the key instrument of freedom of expression, and they did so without abdicating the responsibility of promoting government policies and development priorities.

It worked in the past, because it was credible; it will work now, if it is credible. You cannot talk people who hear and read out of what they perceive to be their good feed. There can be no competition between private media and state media, so, if the approach is right, the public will be informed responsibly at all times. Then we won’t have to worry about any segments of a perceived biased private press.

We part with a fundamental question:

Why are people listening to and reading biased reports in the private media when state of the art state media houses cover the entire reach of the country?

Andrew Sesinyi Speaks...

NO WATER WITH WATER EVERY WHERE

It is a fact that Africans, Botswana nationals included, are at the bottom of the food chain. It is also true that Africans are the most needy, dependent and perpetual scroungers always looking for handouts. And this is being written even now, with conviction, by an African who is nonetheless, proud to be black and in Africa.

The plight of Africans lies in their sycophancy, and yes, laziness of body, mind and thought. They worship dictators, plunderers and are tolerant of disorder, lawlessness, corruption and incompetence. It is not an African culture- it is a product of inferiority complex and acceptance of status quo no matter how abysmal standards may be. Africans would rather run to other countries than work to change their own circumstances.

Pic: the author and his nephew, Shimane Mokgautsi

It is this truth that shall set us free. We have to introspect and dislike what we find in there, inside us, in our minds, thoughts, deeds and lands.

The incompetent governments that we have are our own creation and they are sustained by us. We only become visible protestors when we are engaging in staged violent activities that promote the entrenchment of dictatorships. We are worshippers of idols largely in the form of the dictators we call our leaders. We contaminate our cultures with idolatry titles of greatness that we bestow on incompetent leaders. That is why we are at the bottom of the food chain, the least developed mentally, socially, economically and scientifically. We have fertile lands but infertile minds. How else can we explain such abject poverty, such hunger, such scarcity of food in lands where almost any plant can grow…where wild fruits and other edible plants are in abundance but quickly decimated to make space for absentee landlords and prestigious projects of the political elite?

Our governments do not deserve titles of governance. They blame nature for their people’s poverty; they blame other races for the lack of abundance among their people; they even blame God for their abysmal performance as leaders. It rains in Africa, and it rains a lot. As it rains cats and dogs, the leaders sit in their mansions wining and dining whilst limitless water resources flow, flood and drift towards the seas and oceans, unharvested.

Pic: Gathering rain clouds captured by author's iPhone

Semi-arid countries such as Botswana are a self-contradiction of development because while their few dams hold waters that are subject to loss through evaporation, little effort is made to harvest rain waters through reservoirs and other means. Rain pours on roof tops and flows out into floods without being captured into containers for leaner years. The Botswana infrastructure is not linked to the country’s needs; the infrastructure is not linked to harvesting of natural resources such as rainfall; it is not designed to preserve and conserve. Such lack of thought and foresight is contrasted against government handouts and wails about how the country is prone to rainless drought periods.

Botswana, as one of the benchmarks of failure by Africa to feed its people, has its population fed on empty rhetoric about how governance is striving to improve food production. Yet successive government administrations have abandoned the past colonial innovations of catching rain water in household reservoirs, which used to be the norm.  One would think that if Africans were evolving normally, like people of other continents, contemporary leaders would not only be improving on the excellence of their predecessors but adopting heightened approaches to saving water, or as one prefers to say, harvesting the rain water.

Pic: Sunset over author's modest farm captured via iPhone

Another glaring anomaly, which exists mainly because of poor innovative approaches by governments in Africa- Botswana included- is the neglect of underground water resources. Understandably, underground water must be exploited with conservation regulation because it does have a bearing on present and future tenures of flora and fauna; but if properly tapped on, there would be abundant water resources to water crops, livestock and humans- leading to greater strides in attaining the objectives of food sufficiency. Most households could be run on underground water resources; most farms would prosper from underground water resources; most water restrictions inhibiting food production would be lessened if proper methods were applied to the exploitation of underground water resources.

Studies have been conducted but implementation failed on the subject matter of exploiting Botswana’s underground water resources. By 2017, there ought to have been proper regulation, appropriate licensing and comprehensive infrastructure throughout Botswana facilitating the better use of this precious underground natural resource. Botswana is crippled by periodic drought through bad choice of governance. It is not just a question of constructing more dams (with their high evaporation rate) but a balance of exploitation of both seasonal rainfall and underground water resources. There is a poverty of rationale to explain why after over 50 years, Botswana should still be importing virtually all its food from the colonial streams of supply. There is insufficient justification for the current levels of poverty caused mainly by a lack of food. It is actually a huge embarrassment that food hampers should be the norm in poverty alleviation instead of empowerment of citizenry to produce food, even if it were at subsistence level.

Pic: a mesmerizing cloud formation close to sunset captured by iPhone

Leaders and other officials travel extensively, at the expense of the taxpayer, to developed countries and more innovative benchmark areas such as Libya, Israel, Emirates and other drought prone examples, but they all return to write reports, and file them away without action or follow up. This is the legacy of self –defeat in Africa, to which even Botswana clings as if there is still need to invent the wheel.

Today’s generation owes it to itself, its forefathers and posterity, to adopt a zero tolerance approach to incompetence, corruption, apathy and official neglect of basic development imperatives that can put their country on a good footing and make them proud.

Botswana has taken the lead before, and it still can do so again, and more!

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