Sadly, sometimes Media outlets face challenges in a situation where their reporters are denied coverage, especially from top government officials’ events which is so tormenting and stressing reporters, who are sometimes subjected to detentions without committing any crime.
On Wednesday, October 2024, several Media houses were barred from covering the Judicial reforms workshop in Juba at Radisson Blue, despite the invite by the Ministry of Justice with claim of lack of space by security personnel. Government officials should know that the work of journalists is to inform the public of what is going on in the country. By censoring them, you are denying freedom of expression to the public. The question is why do you invite and then intimidate them?
Yet there is no crime a journalist is causing you. Security personnel should understand that Journalists are doing their work and are not criminals whereby sometimes are subjected to death.
A journalist is responsible for researching and writing news articles, informational news articles, and stories about real events from a fair and unbiased perspective. Their duties include interviewing experts, gathering first-hand accounts of events, and organizing an outline into a cohesive, interesting story. So, denial of access to information is unconstitutional and a total violation of Articles 24 and 32 of the South Sudan Constitution 2011, as mandated.
The Right to Access to Information Act 2013 demands that every citizen has the right to access to information through electronic records held by private or public bodies. So, security organs should know that journalists are doing their work just like them.
The duties of a journalist are to write stories or articles for newspapers, magazines, or websites and create scripts for television or radio. They also review stories or articles for accuracy, style, and grammar. They update stories or articles as new information becomes available. They investigate new story or article ideas and pitch them to editors.
The four roles of journalists are as follows: The normative, cognitive, experienced, and narrated roles correspond to conceptually distinct ideas: what the journal seeks to do, what they want to do, what the journalist does, and what they think they do.
Skills that journalists require include communication. It is the primary role of a journalist to communicate news, either written or verbally. He or she must pay attention to details, be persistent, have skills in research, logical reasoning, and objectivity, and be knowledgeable about all problem-solving.
The basics of journalism always answer the who, what, where, when, and how of a news article. Capacity to develop good content to render good services to an audience that may not have access to any information.
I condemn the act and urge responsibility to propagate, the media’s civic appeal to the Ministry of Justice to advocate for the actual commandments it is missioned to impose guaranteeing that transparency and public rendezvous remain at the vanguard of Governance.
God Protect South Sudan
Be Right Back