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Mirror on the Media: A report of the quarterly media monitoring study in Malawi
June-July, 2005

By Levi Zeleza Manda


The Gender and Media in Southern Africa (GEMSA) country representative and project co-ordinator thanks Ms Irene Phalula and Mr Levi Manda for accepting to monitor the media and promptly submit their individual reports in time. This national report is based on their reports. Thanks also go to the GEMSA and Gender Links for funding the study. Hopefully it will go a long way in understanding and eventually addressing gender disparities in the media.

Executive summary

This is a report of the first Mirror on the Media monitoring project conducted in June - July 2005 in Malawi. The project initiated by Gender Links aimed to extend the gender and Media quarterly trends survey for measuring progress in gender balance in the media. The initial pilot project was conducted in mid 2004 and covered Swaziland, South Africa and Mauritius and concentrated on news items. The current study covered Lesotho, Zimbabwe and Malawi, and monitored radio talk shows.

This is a report on a relatively short study on the presence of women and gender balance in the Malawian media. The monitoring took place in Malawi during the months of June and July, 2005.

The project monitored two radio stations, one public but state controlled (MBC 1) and the other private but donor/advertising reliant (Capital Radio), both of which hold regular talk shows. MBC 1 covers almost the entire nation while Capital Radio covers most towns in the country.

Monitors were appointed by the GEMSA Malawi chapter steering committee, which was coordinated by Stella Mhura, GEMSA national representative. Monitoring was done following GEMSA proposed data collection techniques, and aimed at collecting both quantitative and qualitative data.

The findings are mostly quantitative as qualitative analysis was limited to interviewing show hosts.

In sum, the conclusions drawn from the study are that men rather than women dominate the talk shows as guests, hosts, and callers. During the monitoring duration there was no female guest or host and 61.2% male callers against 6.6% females out of a total 227 although 32.2% of these were unidentified Short Message Service (SMS) participants.

The reasons for not such low female participation are not clear but it is common knowledge in Malawi that women rarely participate in public discussions and this is worse when the topics lean towards economics, law and science. The low participation of women could also be the result of lack of pro-activity by show hosts who easily give up because “women are reluctant” to participate as guests and often refuse when invited.
Background and context

The Mirror on the Media study started as a project of the Gender Links and MISA who jointly studied the portrayal of women in Southern Africa and made comparisons with worldwide trends. The findings indicated that women rarely featured as news makers. The research was mostly quantitative and reviewed recommended qualitative explanations for the disparities. Gender Links has since embarked on studying progress in media vis-à-vis gender balance and the participation of women in the media.
The mirror on the media project aims at extending the Gender and Media quarterly trends survey for monitoring and measuring progress in gender balance in the media. The first pilot phase was conducted in South Africa, Swaziland and Mauritius. This second phase covered Malawi, Lesotho and Zimbabwe.

The aims of the monitoring were to:-
 Establish the extent that women and men’s voices are being included in radio talk shows;
 Determine women’s participation in radio talk sows as invited guests and the capacity in which they appear;
 Establish issues discussed on radio talk shows and the extent to which gender issues are discussed;
 Determine who speaks on which topics and the extent to which men and women speak on different topics;
 Determine the role of talk show hosts and how they help challenge or perpetuate gender stereotypes.

Previous talk show analyses found that women are more often interrupted than men, men rather than women are more often invited as guests and that female guests are addressed more casually than men.

In Malawi, the project monitored the Malawi Broadcasting Corporation and Capital Radio. The monitoring was conducted by Irene Phalula and Levi Zeleza Manda respectively, while Stella Mhura, GEMSA national coordinator, oversaw the research nationally.

Malawi media has known a lot of ups and downs since 1994. There are two principal dailies, five regular weeklies, and a few magazines. The biggest growth has been in the electronic media sector. Today there is one national television station, TVM and one satellite relay-TV operated by the South African giant Multi-Choice. The MBC has two channels (Radios 1 and 2), there are four private commercial radios, Capital Radio, Power 101, MIJ FM, and Joy Radio. There are about six operational community radios: Radio Maria, Radio Alinafe, Radio Islam, Nkhota-Kota Community Radio, Dzimwe Radio, and African Bible College Radio. There are other radios in the offing These include Radio Tivwirane and the Mzimba Volunteers Association (MZIVA) radio.

MBC, MIJ, Capital and Power 101 broadcast nationwide. Although some are not heard in rural areas, they are available in most towns, notably in Blantyre, Lilongwe, Mangochi, Zomba and Mzuzu.

Talk shows are a common feature on most of these radio stations. MBC has Talk of the nation, MJI has Democracy Forum, while has News Talk and Sunday Round table and Power 101 has Power People. The project monitored MBC because it is public broadcaster and Capital Radio because its talk shows have been there for a longer time than most radio stations.

Methodology

The monitoring of talk shows was done in two parts. The first was intended to gather quantitative data while the second phase sought qualitative explanations of the quantitative data. This methodological triangulation was necessary to make the monitoring comprehensive.

The monitoring was done on staggered days of June and July 2005 with the aim of making a total of one week. The methodology was developed by Gender Links.

Due to the ad hoc nature of the Open Forum talk show on MBC1, it was difficult to monitor it in a systematically staggered manner. Further, it is important to note that there was a difference between the two monitors as one included Short Messages (SMS) by mobile phone callers while the MBC1 monitor did not because it was not available.

However, these minor methodological differences have very little if any bearing on the findings of the study.

One limitation was that it was difficult to interview listeners because of budgetary constraints. The exercise would have required going out or calling them. Further, it was not possible for the monitors to know the numbers of the callers as these are not recorded at the stations. Asking the stations to record the numbers of callers would have been considered suspicious.

Media monitored

The project monitored talk shows on two of Malawi’s popular radio stations: the privately owned Capital Radio and the oldest public radio station, Malawi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC1).

The table below indicates the days Capital Radio was monitored and the topics the station featured:

At Capital radio, monitoring was done for six days in a week (Sunday-Friday) staggered over three weeks. The days were:

Date 16 June 19 June 21 June 24 June 27 June 29 June
Day Thursday Sunday Tuesday Friday Monday Wednesday
Time 17.05-18.05 Noon-13.00 hrs 17.05-18.05 17.05-18.05 17.05-18.05 17.05-18.05
Program Newstalk Sunday Round Table Newstalk Newstalk Newstalk Newstalk
Topic Budget Analysis Political Conflicts Parliamentary Debate Quality What MPS must do when parliament sits next If budget is not passed Education views on proposed budget



The table below summarizes the dates MBC radio was monitored and issues that were discussed.

Date 3 June 6 June 17 June 24 June 4 July
Day Friday Monday Friday Friday Monday
Program Open Forum Open Forum Open Forum Open Forum Open Forum
Topic Fuel Price increase Suspension of loan fund Day of the African Child Parliament suspended Minimum qualifications for MPs

Findings
Topics
Since the monitoring was done during the month of June when parliament in Malawi meets to debate the following year’s proposed budget, the topics for discussion tended to lean towards economics and politics. The topics were not gender specific. The only exception to this was a show on MBC on the Day of the African Child in which the plight of orphans and vulnerable children was discussed.

In an interview with a Capital Radio host indicated that topical topics are proposed by anybody in the newsroom, particularly the duty host and later discussed with the Station Manager. At MBC the procedure is the same but the topics are vetted by ‘authorities’. The same is true for invitation of guests. In short, selection of topics and invitations of guests are approved by higher authorities than the talk show hosts.

Hosts

During the monitoring period one male host, except on day, was in control of the show at Capital Radio. The same was true for MBC Radio which was co-presented by three males on two days, and three males on two days. Of the 20 hosts on both capital radio and MBC none was female.



Number of hosts


Guests
MBC Radio One had no guests during the period of monitoring while Capital radio had 6 guests, all male.




Callers


Of the total of 81 callers to the MBC, 72 (88.9%) were male while 9 (7.3%) were female. Of the 227 callers to capital radio, 139 (61.2%) were male, 15 (6.6%) female and 73 (32.2%) unidentified. Those categorized as unidentified participated in the show by giving answers or comments through their mobile phones. This opportunity was given as an alternative by the host. The SMS which was not given any category on the monitoring sheet; hence the disparity between MBC radio report (which did not offer an SMS opportunity anyway) and the Capital Radio monitoring report.

The SMS is an important category because it offers a chance to participate at a cheap price and the participant’s identity be disguised should the participant deem disguise important.
The data are presented below:


Number of callers to Capital Radio


MBC vs Capital Radio

The graph below compares gender desegregation of callers, guests and hosts to the MBC and Capital Radio



On both Capital Radio and MBC men and women were generally treated respectfully and were given ample time to comment on the issue at hand. Only when callers went completely off topic, did the host come to remind the caller about the topic. However, when a female caller made a gender insensitive remark that women are not associated with calm character, none of the three hosts of the show at MBC on June 24, 2005 challenged that stereotyping. Earlier, June 17 on MBC, a male caller said that women are generally cruel an abuse children, which is gender insensitive. None of the hosts challenged that caller. For gender sensitive journalists, these two would have been opportunities to comment on and correct gendered stereotypes. This could be the result of lack of training by some quarters of the media. The hosts were simple not sensit9ive enough to gendered contributions.
Listeners were not interviewed because it was impossible to trace them.
Language

In general the hosts handled the shows professionally explaining the gist of the show and what they expected their callers to contribute. Except for two cases referred to above when one male and one female caller to MBC radio on the plight of orphans on June 17 and the Malawi Rural Development Fund (Mardef) on June 24 made gender insensitive remarks and the hosts did not intervene to correct the situation, the programmes were handled well.
Conclusion

The monitoring exercise offered Malawian journalists to take an introspective look into themselves. Although not comprehensive this study has shown that men dominate talk shows as hosts, guests, and callers.

The hosts explained what the topic was about and what they expected their callers to do. Where relevant, the guests were introduced immediately thereafter. The talk shows were bilingual (English and Chichewa) and in the case of Capital Radio house style, no honorifics or gender identifiers were placed before the guests or callers’ names and identities. These were common on MBC Radio One.

All callers were given equal chances to participate. They were only cut shot when they over spoke and went off topic. According to Capital Radio men usually accepted to be hosts while women were less reluctant. The Gender Links Gender Baseline Survey in 2002 found that men dominate the news as sources and commentators. Although that study did not go into detail about why, previous studies have blamed culture and tradition as being responsible for the suppression of women in public life including opinion expression. But Capital Radio said that it was impossible for the radio station to force people to talk.

Arguably, talk shows cost money and not many people are prepared to spend their hard earnings on things that have no direct bearing on their livelihoods. Since women are mostly preoccupied with raising children, they do not have money to ‘waste’ on ‘useless’ things.

In general, the talk show mood was familiar, gentle and language neutral except in rare cases.

Recommendations

There were topics during the days not monitored that debated issues to which men and women contributed in large numbers. A case in point is when (June 23, 2005) Capital Radio debated Textile Garments It is important for future monitoring projects to monitor an entire month so that all topics for that month are examined.

An interview with Capital FM proves that there is need to look critically into why women refuse to be featured as guests while men are more than willing to do so. In the interview, Brian Banda, talk show host at Capital Radio explained that he chose the topic and it was debated in the newsroom and later vetted by the station manager. The same process is true for the choice of guests. However, when a topic is sponsored, then automatically the guests are selected by the sponsoring organisation.

Banda said Capital radio does its best to invite women into the programme as guests but they often refuse and as a station they could not force anyone to participate in a programme.