CHAPTER 1

Introduction

There is a rapidly growing literature on democratization in Africa,but very little of this literature deals with the important role thatcommunications, or the media, play. However, Nyamnjoh (2005) hasraised the level of the debate on the media and the democratizationagenda in Africa to a very high level with perceptive and insightfulanalysis of the problematic. In his groundbreaking study of the Africanmedia, Nyamnjoh explores the role of the mass media in promotingdemocracy and empowering civil society in Africa. He contextualizesAfrica within the rapidly changing global media and shows how patternsof media ownership and state control have evolved, as well as the hugedifficulties under which most African media workers labor.

Since Africa's mid-century emergence from colonial rule, the search forstable democratic institutions has gone on too often in "fits and starts," asAdeyinka (1995) noted. And nowhere has the struggle been more evidentthan within the African press. Democratic press values and practices havebeen habits sorely lacking throughout much of modern Africa.

As Tettey rightly observes:

A major fillip to the process of democratization andcitizen engagement in Africa has been the changesin media ownership and pluralism over the last twodecades or so. There is no question about the fact thatthe media landscape in Africa over this period has shownsignificant shifts, with tremendous expansion in thenumber of media outlets as democratic transformationsmake inroads into what used to be largely dictatorialpolitical environments. Even countries with regimes thatare not receptive to democratic ideals have not escapedthese developments and have seen spaces open formediated politics. (Tettey 2008)

It is no secret that governments everywhere are not enamored of coveragethat will put them in a bad light. However, an informed and engagedcitizenry is not cultivated by foisting on them only the politicallypalatable. The media in various African countries have demonstratedthat they are willing to defy the wrath of their governments to bringinformation to the public that will enable them to accurately assess theirpolitical leaders and hold them accountable (Tettey 2008).

It is a general belief that only one African nation delivered anythingof value to its citizens within the first fifteen years of independence—Botswana—whereasin other countries, the only winners were thepresident and his cronies (Karikari 2004).

In the case of The Gambia, perhaps, to borrow from Chinua Achebe, itcan best be summed up this way: "We had been in the rain together untilyesterday. Then a handful of us—the smart, and the lucky—hardly everhad to scramble for the one shelter our former rulers left, and had takenit over and barricaded themselves in" (Achebe, 1966). This was as trueof the Jawara regime of 1965 as it is of the Jammeh regime of 1994, andit is even more so today. The Gambia was certainly groping in the darkafter almost three decades of so-called independence. The instrumentsof power were hijacked by the People's Progressive Party (PPP), andthe process of democratization halted in mid-progress, largely becausecivil society was severely weakened. There was no incentive to organize,because there were no publicly expressed issues to organize around—thenewsmakers were mute largely due to the fact that there was no outletto issue opinion, and there was a weak alternative to act as a sponsor forideas from competing stakeholders. And a systematic entrenchment of aone-party state, unquestioned, emerged.

It seemed that panoply of the most crucial aspects of democracy wasinstituted over time. The systems that were needed to check againstcorruption, impunity, and abuse of the national interest and assets haderoded away, because those that should have been empowered to checkthem were disenfranchised by a system that had grown too powerfulto be dismantled. The crony system of the state was too massive, toointimidating, and too powerful, whereas the primary blueprint for goodgovernance, like the constitution, although still in place, was dormant.The protectors of the most sacred document (the Constitution) of theFirst Republic, the legislature, were transfixed by power. Therefore, withthe fixation of control over every aspect of governance, the private media,which were the only institution that could not be directly manipulated bythe political elite, were simply pushed aside. In a state where the rulingparty also controlled the majority of the seats in the House of Parliamentthat made laws, appointed the judiciary, and approved budgets, therewas only one way the nation would head—one direction—chosen by thepresident Yahya Jammeh, and it was not necessarily the best course.

The picture is completely blurred when trying to critically analyze atrack record of freedom of the press and good governance from 1965 to1994—and this has been the case even until now, especially when theissue of the fourth estate is scrutinized. As evidence shows, the media hadalways remained a tool for either propaganda by the government or as anenemy of the government. It has never been viewed as an unbiased assetin the issue of governance or nation building. During all the years of theFirst Republic, the People's Progressive Party's government suspectedthe private media of working against them. The private media detestedthis attitude and, in turn, focused most of their energies in simplystaying alive and active by the only way they knew how: by pesteringthe government for information, by constantly gnawing at its heels,and forcing it to be on the defensive. This tactic, while effective in theshort run, becomes untenable in the long run, as the government simplyclamors inward and never deals with the private media, causing them torely on rumors, or possibly unreliable sources.

Everywhere in Africa, radio is the popular medium, but rarely is radiofree of government ownership or constraint. The print press serves amuch smaller audience, and in many sub-Saharan countries, television iseven more limited, viewed only by a tiny minority of affluent householdswho prefer satellite programming from Europe and North Americarather than bother with the slender fare of local channels (Karikari,2004). Economic backwardness is only partly to blame for journalisticunderdevelopment; much deeper—and more troubling—has been along-standing belief among many African governments that the pressshould be handmaiden of the state and the development process. In thepast few years, with a fresh, continent-wide sweep of democratization, asmall but authentically free press has begun to emerge in most Africancountries—albeit with governments anxiously looking on, deeply mixedin their views and their degree of tolerance for dissent. Journalists, notsurprisingly, hold radically divergent views of their responsibilities androles.

At the time of writing, The Gambia has nine newspapers, eighteenradio stations, and one television station. Yet, The Gambia—despiteoutward signs of what once seemed to promise a modern and vibrantpress-government relationship—is hobbled today by what is in reality amuch bleaker system.

Adapting Italian social theorist Antonio Grimace's concept of hegemony,this book traces the oscillation between subtle and overt forms ofcoercion, cooptation, seduction, and outright domination used by aseries of military and civilian machinations meant to bend the press totheir wills. The media landscape in The Gambia changed drastically afterthe military overthrew democratically elected government in July 1994.Although military rulers were quick to label themselves as "soldiers witha difference" and urged the public to criticize them wherever they wentwrong, they were equally swift in revealing their true colors. Within ashort while, the Armed Forces Provisional Ruling Council (AFPRC)pounced on the media.

The AFPRC regime metamorphosed into a civilian regime andrechristened itself the Alliance for Patriotic Reorientation andConstruction (APRC). Despite its promises to uphold and safeguard thedemocratic principles embedded in the country, it instead eroded andflouted every aspect of those principles. Journalists became the regime'sgreatest victim, despite the fact that the regime had established the firsttelevision station in the country, as well as given operational licenses toa number of media outlets. The head of the military junta, ChairmanYahya Jammeh, was quick to label journalists the "unworthy sons ofAfrica" and called on people not to buy newspapers in order to put themout of business.

Economically, The Gambia is very weak, with the majority of thepopulation living on less than a dollar a day. The country depends ontourism as its major income earner, particularly as drought has causedgroundnut and cotton export to decline over the years. The nationalcurrency, the dalasi, has seriously depreciated against major internationalforeign currencies, causing a negative impact on the media and otherinstitutions. Although the business sector has seen a tremendous boom inthe last few years, with significant investment coming into the country,this has created very little impact on the media, even in advertising. Mostbusinesses in The Gambia are not keen on advertising with the privatemedia for fear of reprisal from the government. Those who have daredto test the waters have been labeled "opposition sympathizers." Similarly,no government agency places standard advertisements in the privatepress. These same agencies, however, are quick to fill the pages of privatemedia with propaganda and congratulatory messages for the presidentYahya Jammeh on special occasions such as his birthday and the day hecame to power, thereby adding a negative political dimension to someadvertising.

BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GAMBIA

The Gambia is said to have been Britain's first colony in West Africa(Southorn, 13). It was also the last of the four former British colonies inWest Africa to be granted independence.

The pre-colonial history of the area around the banks of the GambiaRiver dates back several centuries. The Carthaginian explorer, Hanno,had referred to The Gambia in his writing about his voyage in WestAfrica in 470 B.C. (The Gambia, the Land and the People, NouvellesEditions Africaines, 9).

From the fifth to the eighth century A.D., most of the Senegambianarea was part of the Ghana Empire. Then came the invasion by theAlmoravides, the Muslim Berbers from North Africa who brought Islamto West Africa.

From the thirteenth to the sixteenth century, the area was under thecontrol of the Mali Empire. The Gambia was then inhabited by Wollofson the north bank of the river and the Jolas on the south bank. Whenthe Mali Empire collapsed, the Mandingo and Susu leaders who ruledthe empire returned to Futa Jallon and continued to exercise influenceover parts of The Gambia, and what is now the Cassamance region ofSenegal until the early eighteenth century.

The area was then invaded by Fula warriors, which resulted in theSoinke-Marabout (pagan-Muslim) wars of the eighteenth and nineteenthcentury. The Gambia's first significant contact with Europeans datesback to the fifteenth century. The Portuguese were probably the firstexplorers to enter the River Gambia with the mission in 1455 of Luizde Cadamosto (Gray 1966, 5). The Spanish followed in 1475 and theEnglish in 1588. This period saw intense rivalry between Europeanexplorers with the Dutch, French, and the Courlanders (Germans), allsending missions to The Gambia because the area was believed to be veryrich in gold and other precious minerals.

The Portuguese presence in The Gambia lasted more than 130 years, andduring this period they introduced groundnuts (now the country's maincash crop), orange, lime, and pawpaw from Brazil (ibid, 15).

The end of the Portuguese influence in The Gambia was marked byintense activity and bids for control of an island thirty-two kilometersup the river that the Portuguese had named Saint Andrew's Island. TheCourlanders built a fort on the island in 1651, but it was captured by theFrench in 1659. The Courlanders reclaimed it the following year only tolose it to an English naval force the year after. The English renamed theisland Fort James.

But although the British capture of James Island gave them a strategicposition from which to monitor traffic on the river, and they did nothave total control over the surrounding area. On the north bank of theriver, directly opposite the island, the settlement of Albreda was leased tothe French in 1681 by the king of Niumi.

From 1689 to 1702, the French and British tried to dislodge one anotherfrom the two settlements, but the French remained at Albreda until1857, well after the Treaty of Versailles in 1783 confirmed British ruleover The Gambia (Palmer 1988, 123-125).

In 1763, the Treaty of Paris, which ended the Seven Year War, gaveSenegal (except the island of Goree) to Britain. For a period of fifty-oneyears (1763-1814), The Gambia was ruled as part of the British colonyof Senegambia, with the governor based at Saint Louis in Senegal, andthe lieutenant-governor for The Gambia based at James Island (Gray1966, 125).

James Island played two major contrasting roles in the slave trade. Itserved as a major loading point from the time the first slave ship left TheGambia in 1510 until the trade was abolished by the British in 1807.After the abolition, the island served as a strategic point from which tostop slave ships.

It was from this point that Kunta Kinteh, the great-grandfather of AlexHailey, author of the bestseller Roots, was believed to have been shippedto the United States as a slave. Kunta Kinteh was reportedly capturedoutside his village of Juffure, which is a kilometer away from the banksof the river and the settlement of Albreda.

In 1816, the British, wishing to exercise tighter control over the riverin order to enforce the ban on the slave trade, leased from the king ofKombo the uninhabited island at the mouth of the river (Gray 1966,127-128).

The island known locally as Banjul (the Mandika word for "bamboofiber") was renamed Saint Mary's Island, and the settlement establishedthere later was called Bathurst. Bathurst soon replaced James Island asthe major British settlement and became the territory's capital uponindependence in 1965. In 1973, the city reverted to its original Gambianname, Banjul.

Even at the time that the British leased the Island of Saint Mary in 1816,they were not particularly interested in maintaining The Gambia as acolony. Their main interest was the river, and when they abolished theslave trade in 1807, the colony was handed over to the governor of SierraLeone. The British were undecided on what status they should give theterritory. One moment it was ruled from Sierra Leone, the next it wasmade a crown colony only to be relegated a few years later to the statusof a settlement.

However, in 1888, the territory was finally separated from Sierra Leone(Hughes 1988, 480). The Gambian Island of Saint Mary and Island ofGeorgetown, which is further up the river, became a crown colony with alegislative council, while the rest of the territory became a protectorate.

Though The Gambia was the oldest British West African colony, it wasthe last one to seek and obtain independence, which it finally did in1965.

A SKETCH OF POLITICS IN THE GAMBIA

For more than a quarter of a century, The Gambia was one ofSub-Saharan Africa's longest-standing multiparty democracies. It wasperceived (along with Botswana and Mauritius) as an "exception" onthe African continent, where authoritarianism and military regimes arethe norm (Africa Development, 2000). Apart from the aborted coupof 1981, The Gambia had enjoyed relative peace and stability since itattained independence from Britain in 1965. In 1994, The Gambia wasperceived again as a deviant case when a military coup d'état toppled SirDawda Kairaba Jawara's People's Progressive Party (PPP) government,thereby bucking the post-1989 Sub-Saharan African trend away fromauthoritarianism toward multiparty politics (Edie, 2000). On July 22,1994, The Gambia National Army led by Lieutenant Yahya Jammehoverthrew the Jawara-led PPP government that had been in power forthree decades. The immediate issues, which seemed to have sparked thecoup d'état, surrounded grievances within the military with regard tothe appointment of Nigerians to senior command positions, late salarypayments, poor living conditions in the barracks, and displeasure overincreased corruption, especially within the senior ranks of the army(Radel and McPherson 1995; Wiseman 1996). Yahya Jammeh allegedlyhad a personal grievance against President Jawara for transferring himfrom his position as Commander of the Presidential Guard after onlyfour months, and disarming and returning him to the barracks a daybefore the coup (Wiseman 1996).