Roland Affail Monney
A two-day conference to discuss strategies to shape the media industry on the African continent in response to the COVID-19 pandemic has opened in Accra.
The conference, which is meant for leaders of regional and national media organizations in Africa and being organised by the Federación of African Journalists (FAJ), will give priority attention to the general precarious working conditions of journalists.
A statement signed by a member of FAJ’s Steering Committee, Roland Affail Monney, said “the conference will explore viable options to strengthen the bargaining capacity of journalist unions in Africa” and would end on Wednesday, June 2, 2021.
According to the statement, the COVID-19 pandemic has dealt “a terrible blow to jobs” and continues to threaten media sustainability, adding that “the conference will also examine the worrisome erosion of media freedom in many countries in Africa and propose practical measures to reverse the trend.”
“The conference is expected to come out with the Accra Declaration which will articulate the future direction of journalism in Africa,” the statement stressed.
It added that the President of FAJ, El- Sadig Ibrahim Ahmed Ibrahim and a representative of the African Union, and Ambassador Ahmed Salah had already joined the conference.
By Ernest Kofi Adu