Keidy teaches the villagers how to handle a camera, film still: insight share, CC-by-nc-nd 2.0

Fernando M. doesn’t actually look like a revolutionary. Slender as a boy he crouches on the floor, the microphone has fallen into his lap. Only his weather-beaten face betrays the 40, maybe 50 years. Barren is the soil beneath him, light and desolate the forest, but Fernando’s face shows a different landscape: laughter lines and a glimmer of hope. He doesn’t even seem to notice the camera in the young woman’s hand.

No journalist in the world could have filmed Fernando the way Keidy T. did it. Together with other indigenous activists the 23-year-old documented the situation of the Igorot people in the mountains of the Northern Philippine island Luzon. Fernando distrusts the Philippine mainstream media; upon him they ignore the situation of the indigenous people and widely cover the corrupt government for fear of persecution. Unlike Keidy and her team: While they shoot the documentary “Es-Esel Ja Eparas” (“Voices of Experience”) during a workshop of the British video laboratory InsightShare, they have the villagers on their side: Aren’t they also indigenous people, don’t they speak Filipino and ask the right questions? At the end of each shooting day, the whole village gathers in a festive mood on the market place to watch the shots. Right there Fernando negotiates how he will be seen in the film – and how not.

Fernando M. in an interview with young indigenous people, film still: insight share, CC-by-nc-nd 2.0

Where monkeys and boars were still roaming the rain forest when Fernando was young, nowadays prairie grasses and rotten fruit knuckles under storm and heat. The fight against the destruction of the natural environment affilliate the old with the young Igorot: Where Fernando and his men blocked the access routes to the gold mine in the nineties, their children are facing a more abstract enemy: the global climate change can only be met with global media work.

Media projects such as InsightShare or the network of bloggers Rising Voices believe in the best of all possible worlds: a world in which the disenfranchised rise their voices, the marginalised step into the center and the indigenous record their traditional cosmovision with the latest technology. If a media workshop enables a group to fight for its rights in the long run, citizen journalism reaches its ultimate destination: in the hands of the weakest.

Approx. location of the village G. in the Philippine Cordillera, Screenshot: Google Maps, CC-by-nc-nd 2.0

“Digital pollution” or “fifth pillar of democracy”?
Citizen journalism. Many professional journalists consider this very term as an oxymoron, if not as an attack on their professional honour. Some mock those “digital polluters”, those “Sunday drivers on the information superhighway”, others fear the apparent competition – but still many journalist use their writings. Citizen journalism is a grab bag; one could argue about the quality of the entries in the Heise forums, the ideological struggles of Indymedia or about how relevant most of the 115 million worldwide blogs really are. Identifying the really independent, reliable, wide-ranging and relevant information in the middle of the World Wide Web’s unpaid, unedited and possibly unresearched sign salad is like looking for a needle in a haystack, but it is worth it.

Most citizen journalists don’t try to compete with the established media, but to create a civilian counter public: They consider themselves as fifth pillar of the state, holding up democracy and human rights, when everything else is in ruins. When Rezwan, a student from Bangladesh started his blog The Third World View in 2003, he had no idea how important it would become one day. With his messages on a nostalgic papyrus ground he was part of the online-avantgarde in Bangladesh. Only when in 2004 the Unicode standard for the Bengali script was established and the first blogger platforms were founded in 2005, the sport of the nerds became a mainstream activity of the young educated elite. Today, about 50,000 Bengalis are blogging, but many from the diaspora. Not without reason.

Rezwan blogs about repression in Bangladesh (2007), screenshot, CC-by-nc-nd 2.0

The magic moment for Rezwan’s blog was a sad day for his country: On January 11th, 2007, the government of Bangladesh imposed a state of emergency, after people started protesting violently against electional fraud. Nearly 100,000 people got arrested. Rezwan blogger-friend narrowly escaped: Exile in Sweden was Tasneem Khalil’s only refuge. Rezwan’s blog was swept by hate-filled comments, but he was outside the line of fire, in Berlin. His Third World View became a so-called “bridge blog”; Rezwan combed through the Bengali media several times a day and explained the most explosive news to an English-speaking public. He was far away from home, but yet right in the centre of the events.

Anonymous activist
In his offline world, Rezwan had to become an accountant, but online he may be an activist. In his home country not a single politician would listen to him, but in the internet he has 200-300 readers every day. He just reported that the Bengali government blocked Facebook after Mohammed cartoons haunted across the network. He carefully quotes other bloggers, behind whose statements he discreetly hides his own criticism. Since the riots of 2007 Rezwan has become carful: He wants to reveal neither his last name nor his age; during the skype interview he turns off his webcam. A thumbnail-size picture of him circulating in the web shows a handsome young man, one among thousands. “Only as long as I remain anonymous, I am free to write what I want,” Rezwan says. “I would really like to be a professional journalist, but in that case I’d have to give my name and bury my activism.”

“The world speaks to you, do you listen?”
In 2007, the operators of the most important global portal for citizen journalism noticed the Bengali blogger: Global Voices published excerpts of his features from the police state – a big honor in the internet community. Tripod-founder Ethan Chairman and former CNN bureau director Rebecca MacKinnon founded the network in December 2004 to provide a podium for the most interesting perspectives of citizen journalism around the world. The motto: “The world speaks to you, do you listen?” One million visitors a month answer this question with “yes”. More than 300 volunteers around the world watch the blogosphere in 150 countries and translate the selected text into 15 languages. In addition, the portal encourages new bloggers through workshops, link the international blogging community by organising conferences and provide legal assistance.

A parcel on the sixth continent
The Internet is large, and its settlement will hardly ever end. On the “sixth continent” even the landless and disenfranchised have the chance to stake their plot. No wonder that nowhere such an enthusiasm for the new media can be felt as in the so-called developing and emerging countries. On their way into the online world, so-far marginalized groups simply leave out less efficient development steps of the Western world: they “leap-frog”. In no time Rezwan and Keidy have become experts and opinion leaders; however, until today, they earn no Rupiah and no Taka with their work.

When Global Voices founded the daughter network Rising Voices in 2007, Rezwan joint in as a volunteer editor right from the beginning. Rising Voices has an approach, which is quite similar to the British video NGO InsightShare: Both aim at taking citizen journalism to a grass roots level, from an urban elite into the rural areas, from the young and trendy to children and old people. While InsideShare has built eight video-hubs in ghettos and indigenous villages, Rising Voices commissioned 25 local NGOs and well-known blogger with teaching blogging to a local group.

Bloggers build bridges
The results can be seen until today: There are doctors and nurses of a Romanian hospice writing about the last days of their patients; activists in Yemen blog for women rights; Liberian bloggers build bridges between those in exile and those who stayed at home. The success rate of the project is relatively high; at least ten to 20 percent of the participants are still blogging three years after the seminars, Rezwan says.

Keidy T. in a skype interview with the author (Screenshot)

Meanwhile, the young Filipina Keidy T. became the director of the video hub in the Philippines. The demand is big; soon the 23-year-old will herself train video trainers – even on the Southern island of Mindanao, where Muslim rebels and the central government are fighting against each other. She has already received anonymious threats for her commitment; she and her colleagues feel observed. But giving up? Keidy smiles enigmatically. It’s the smile of Fernando M., it seems to say: Our people have been through worse.

It seems long since she has travelled to the Climate Conference in Copenhagen with her very first film from the village of G. Like many NGOs they didn’t get an official accreditation for the conference; instead they received standing ovations for their presentation on the civilian counter-conference. For a moment the world listened to a small woman from the Southern hemisphere who had never left her country before: “We indigenous people have contributed least to climate change, yet we suffer the most.” At the other end of the earth a village holds its breath.

_____

Useful Links  (all checked on Sept. 21st, 2011)
Online-Portal „Global Voices“: Facts about citizen journalism

Sourcewatch: List of Citizen Journalism Websites

Website of the NGO InsightShare: What is Participatory Video? (video, 3:14 min.)

Website of the NGO InsightShare: Es-Esel Ja Eparas/ Voices of Experience, (video, 17:29 min.)

Website of the NGO InsightShare: presentation of 9 further video hubs

Online-Portal „Rising Voices“: Active Rising Voices Projects

Online-Portal „Global Voices“: Current selected articles

Online-Portal „Global Voices“: threast to civil journalism worldwide (map)

Blog by Rezwan: The Third World View

Online-Portal „Global Voices“: Manifesto

Blog of Ushahidi: African Crisis Information Portal working via crowdsourcing

This article first appeared in an online magazine project of the EJS School of Journalism in Berlin (Evangelische Journalistenschule) led by Matthias Spielkamp and Peter Berger. It was shortlisted for the Minority Voices Young Journalism Award in June 2011. E-Mail the author at christina.felschen(a)gmx.de or visit www.chessocampo.blogspot.com.

After a 30-hours-journey from Ciudad Juárez to the Global Media Forum in Bonn, Judith Torrea was tired, but still full of energy. (Screenshot from author's video)

Judith, you have been reporting on Ciudad Juárez for 15 years now and even moved there in 2009 – what draw you towards one of the most dangerous cities in the world?
I am a journalist and our duty is to tell the stories that have to be told. If we don’t do that, we become accomplices of war, massacres or genocides like those involved in the so-called „War on Drugs“ led by the Mexican president Felipe Calderón. Once I stepped into this topic I couldn’t just ignore it and go back to Washington as if nothing had happened.

Stepping into it, how did that happen?
Even if I was born in Northern Spain, my heart is purely Mexican, it’s Juárezian. I always wanted to live in Mexico, but finally it all happened by pure coincidence. Fifteen years ago I crossed the Mexican border for the first time and the first city I came across was Ciudad Juárez. At that time the first women were disappearing, and there was nobody else who was reporting on it.

Most bloggers are citizen journalists and activists – when you started blogging, you have already been a highly experienced and awarded journalist. What made you leave your prestigious job as a White House correspondent and become a blogger in Mexico?
Originally, I wanted to work there as a freelance journalist. But then I discovered that in full economic crisis, nobody wanted to buy my stories. But I didn’t want to give up: I published them on a blog instead – not to nourish me, but to lift my spirits. I even renounced on advertisements or collaborations with traditional media, because I want to be as independent as possible. However, I would never have thought that it might become so popular and even receive the prestigious BOB Awards. Just consider how technically simple it looks. Perhaps I won’t earn much money with this blog, but it makes me happy. In times like those Juárez is going through, it is essential that people rise their voices, that they talk or write about what they are experiencing. I also teach citizen journalists in Juárez – my “pupils” are common people, but they tell some stories better than me.

You have been the first Spanish reporter to witness and report about death penalty executions in the US – another dark topic. Are you fascinated by the proximity of death?
In no way! I am a very happy person who loves life. But Juárez is my mission. Nobody asks to be born in a certain place at a certain time. If I don’t tell the story of Juárez, the winners of this „War on Drugs“ will tell it. What keeps me here is my passion and my love for this city. I am fascinated by the mothers of the murdered girls who succeed in transforming adversities into strength. Ciudad Juárez taught me to live.

What was your impression of Juárez when you entered the city for the first time? Was it love at first sight?
The city is neither fascinating nor beautiful. But when you cross the bridge across the US-Mexican border into Juárez, you immediately feel the energy of this town. It’s a women’s city: While many men are unemployed, women have for decades worked in the export oriented assembly plants, the maquilas. Their strong position causes jealousy in the city’s macho culture.

“Hours go by. The fear. She doesn't come back. Days go by. Years.” – Many mothers are still waiting for their daughters to come back, years after their disappearance. Judith Torrea blogs about forbidden activism, ghost towns and the power of memory (Screenshot of Torrea's blog)

Since 1993 hundreds or thousands of young women have been murdered in Juárez; many locals even speak of 5.000 cases. You said that the first media reports came extremely late – how does the Mexican press react?
Absurdly the first newspaper that reported on it was the New York Times. The Mexican press even claimed that the people of Juárez invented these stories, following the discourse of president Felipe Calderón. Mexican media is mainly concentrated in two outlets tightly related to the government. Today mainstream media can’t ignore the feminicidios any longer, but instead of analyzing the reasons for it, they show gruesome pictures of the victims and indirectly blame them for provoking these violent acts by dressing up or going out.

The city lacks international attention: You are the only foreign journalist living in Juárez – and when you wanted to sell your first freelance stories on Juárez in 2009, the editorial offices weren’t interested. Where does this ignorance come from?
Mexico is not Afghanistan. Many foreign editors don’t consider it an important topic. Furthermore it is a dangerous job; many journalists come with bodyguards and don’t want to sleep in the city, because they don’t want to risk anything. When I was back in New York reading the news about the so-called „War on Drugs“ in Ciudad Juárez, I realized that my perspective differed from that of most journalists: Unlike them, I distrust Calderón when he states that the victims have been related to drug dealing.

Once you accused the Mexican president Felipe Calderón on TV of supporting the Sinaloa Cartel, the most powerful drug cartel in Juárez. Are you not frightened?
The only fear I have is not doing what I have to do. I am a journalist that will never betray herself, that is not corrupt. Neither the Sinaloa Cartel nor Calderón can stop me. As Juárezians, we all share the same danger.

Have you ever been threatened?
The government tries to put me under constant pressure. But I won’t go into details.

What will the future bring for Juárez?
Peace will come soon; the death toll is already dropping. But it won’t be a peace for the love of peace – Calderon’s „War on Drugs“ simply costs too much money. And it will be a false peace: This “War” has left tremendous social problems, hundreds of orphans, empty houses, lots of unemployed and many, many traumatized people.

What will you do when this „War“ is over?
Hard to say – I hardly ever think about the future.

Interview conducted in Spanish and translated into English

Judith Torrea’s blog: www.juarezenlasombra.blogspot.com
Her book: Torrea, Judith: Juárez en la sombra: crónica de una ciudad que se resiste a morir. Aguilar, 2011.

• Ciudad Juárez is a city of 1,5 million inhabitants in Northern Mexico directly bordering the US city El Paso. Due to its location, the city is a major point of entry and transportation into the United States – for migrants and goods as well as for drugs. Juárez attracted several drug cartels by its low-wage work force, the proximity of the lucrative U.S. market and its social disorganization. In the 90ies it became the epicentre of Mexico’s “War on Drugs”; with between 6 and 27 homicides each day it is considered “the most violent zone in the world outside of declared war zones.”

• Judith Torrea is a 37-year-old journalist from Pamplona/ Spain. After working for several US media she decided to dedicate her work to the fight against drug trafficking and the Mexican „War on Drugs“. She was awarded with the Spanish journalist award Premio Ortega y Gasset as well as with Deutsche Welle’s international weblog awards, the BOBs, for her blog “Ciudad Juárez, en la sombre del narcotráfico” (Ciudad Juárez in the shadow of drug trafficking). Based on her blog and long lasting experience she recently published her book “Juárez en la sombra” (Juárez in the shadow).

This interview first appeared in Orange Magazine of the European Youth Press in June 2011 as part of its coverage of the Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum. E-Mail the author at christina.felschen(a)gmx.de or visit www.chessocampo.blogspot.com.

”How could you criticize our Dear Leader?“

It was this sentence, spoken in a small restaurant in a Chinese town bordering North Korea, that changed Tae Keung Ha’s life. The young man had just run into a group of teenage refugees begging at a marketplace and had spontaneously invited them to eat a meat stew. But although they were very hungry, they could only sip the soup. “We have never had meat in our lives,“ they said. “We cannot digest it.“

When Ha started criticizing Kim Jong-il for depriving them and their fellow citizens of basic human needs, the teenagers put down their spoons, indignantly: “How could you…?”

Globalization, with its virtues and vices, has conquered nearly all parts of the world, allowing worldwide friendships as well as global drug and weapon trade. But a handful of countries still try to seal off their citizens from these tendencies. Undoubtedly the most shielded among those carceral states is the hereditary dictatorship of North Korea.

But things are changing, even in the self-proclaimed “Juche” (self-reliant) State—and South Korean activists like the 43-year-old Ha play an important part in that. Upon his unforgettable encounter with the young North Koreans, Ha founded the Open Radio for North Korea in 2005, broadcasting from Seoul to North Korea. His programming is diverse, ranging from world news to South Korean soap operas and greetings from South Koreans to their family members in the North.

How do people in North Korea live? One thing is for sure: Not like this Pyongyang mural suggests! (Photo: Christopher Schoenbohm/Wandering the world)

A dangerous job

After six years, Tae Keung Ha now has 20 full-time staff journalists working with him in Seoul as well as six correspondents in North Korea, all situated less than ten kilometres from the Chinese borders. That location is no coincidence: They use Chinese mobile phones for transmitting their reports to Ha’s Open Radio, but these phones only work close to the border. Being a correspondent at Open Radio is a dangerous job: If they are caught, they will almost certainly be sent to one of the North Korean prison camps where approximately 200,000 people are kept. Chances for survival according to Amnesty International are estimated at 60 per cent.

Even Tae Keung Ha is not entirely safe: He believes that the North Korean government could easily send its secret service to let him disappear. “But I don’t think they will harm me,“ he says. ‘They would be associated with terrorism as a consequence, which would provoke international intervention. Kim Jong-il is aware of that. Unlike their inferiors, the regime is well-informed about world politics.”

Tae Keung Ha smiles confidently, like a person who has seen enough in his life to no longer be afraid. Ha has already been imprisoned for two years in his early twenties, while fighting against the former South Korean despot Chun Doo-hwan. “I cannot shut up—I think I was born an activist!“

But given the dreadful sentences, who dares to listen to his radio? When talking about his audience, Ha looks into the void, recalling numbers and abstracts: “According to our surveys, about one-fourth of the 24 million inhabitants have access to radio receivers, and four percent have already listened to foreign programs.“

Ha clings to these however uncertain facts about the most impenetrable country on earth. In dealing with North Korea, most people rely on speculations, and questioning one’s own methodology has become essential: Are refugees sufficiently balanced sources? And how can NGO workers and journalists differ between true life and Potemkin villages? Even Ha, who has devoted his life to his neighbours behind the heavily militarized border, has never been to North Korea. Kim Jong-il would never let him in.

Where is North Korea going to? This traffic police guard will hardly know it. (Photo: adaptorplug/flickr.com)

North Koreans fall for flirts and Brad Pitt – a different perspective

The situation is completely different for Karen Janz, a rural development consultant and one of the few foreigners who can claim to know North Korea: From 2005 to 2010, she led the office of the German aid organisation Welthungerhilfe in Pyongyang. “Certainly, the leaders always knew where I was and what I was doing,” she says. “With only around 50 foreigners in the country, it’s easy.“

But once Janz and her organisation enjoyed the authorities’ confidence, she was allowed to travel to the countryside on her own. And much of what she tells contradicts everything we believe to know about the country. “North Korean people are extremely well-educated, they have a great sense of humour and like to flirt,“ Janz shares. “And they are better informed than we think, even without access to the Internet.“ In a sauna in Pyongyang, Janz met a 15 year-old girl asking her: “Do you prefer Keanu Reeves or Brad Pitt?”

In fact, North Koreans seem to know a lot more about the world than we can grasp about their country. Security measures for foreign journalists are rigid, whereas information technology no longer presents an insurmountable border for North Koreans as Tae Keung Ha’s Open Radio shows. Unlike most of the ten other radios broadcasting into North Korea, many of which are run by the Seoul government, private or religious groups, Ha’s radio is totally independent and free of ideology. “Personally, I would wish the Koreas to be reconciled one day, like Germany after the Cold War,“ he admits. “But this must be entirely up to the North Koreans. When their country becomes free, they will have to take their own political decisions—probably for the first time in their lives.“

But when will this first time be? When Ha was reporting on the Arab revolutions in spring, his hopes were flying high. A correspondent told him that a similar uprising might also happen in North Korea; not right away, but possibly after the death of 70-year-old Kim Jong-il.

In the meantime, hundreds of families hope to be reunited before their death. Recently a man in his sixties came into Ha’s editorial office to produce a one-hour radio show all by himself. He dedicated it to his father in the North whom he hadn’t seen for decades, hoping that the old man was still alive to draw hope from his greetings.

• The Koreas: North Korea is a single-party-state with an elaborate cult of personality around the Kim family. Korea was devided in 1945, after having been occupied by the Japanese since 1910. Border conflicts led to the Korean War from 1950 to 1953. The relative peace has since regularly been interrupted by assassination attempts on South Korean leaders and border skirmishes, most recently in 2010 when the Pyongyang regime attacked the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong.

• Closed Societies: Not all societies that remain closed against the outdoors violate human rights. Societies isolate themselves for different reasons, to different extents and not necessarily enforce this upon their people: Carceral States like North Korea, Burma or Cuba obviously have few in common with voluntary forms of isolation practiced by Gated Communities or uncontacted tribes in the Amazonian.

This article first appeared in Orange Magazine of the European Youth Press in June 2011 as part of its coverage of the Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum. E-Mail the author at christina.felschen(a)gmx.de or visit www.chessocampo.blogspot.com.

1^er avril 1977. La localité de Setto, un peu après Bohicon (vers le centre du Bénin), connut une tragédie: Abdoulaye Issa, préfet de la province de l’Atacora (nord-ouest du pays) à l’époque, venait de disparaitre dans un accident de la circulation, en retournant à Natitingou (chef-lieu de province). Il n’avait alors que 32 ans.  34 ans après cette tragédie, la génération d’après la révolution marxiste au Bénin (1972-1989) peut apprendre à connaitre l’homme à travers « Abdoulaye Issa, Trop tôt à Setto ». Un essai biographique qui retrace la vie de l’homme et surtout son combat pour le développement du Bénin à partir de la base.

7 chapitres, mais surtout 108 pages de rappel, 108 pages d’histoire pour conter avec beaucoup d’humour et de jeu de mots, celui qui fût, selon ceux qui l’ont réellement connu et pratiqué, ses anciens collaborateurs et compagnons de lutte, le leader du nord, le jeune révolutionnaire désintéressé et surtout le patriote invétéré.

Selon le directeur des Editions Sinaï, Tiburce Adagbé,  le livre commence par une histoire de maraboutage, une histoire qui rencontrerait le scepticisme des uns et des autres, mais qui remonte peu à peu, par un débat plus rationnel et plus intellectuel. Exposant les interactions entre deux courants de pensée qui se distinguaient par leur approche de la révolution à l’époque : le premier vouant un soutien sans conditions à la révolution, et le second (auquel faisait partie Abdoulaye Issa) révoquait le mouvement révolutionnaire, à ces débuts. Pourtant ce même Abdoulaye Issa deviendra comme le fer de lance de la révolution dahoméenne. « Abdoulaye Issa a eu la clairvoyance de faire évoluer ses idées, jusqu’à devenir préfet de la province de l’Atacora », a déduit Tiburce Adagbé. C’est à ce poste que, pendant trois ans, l’illustre disparu déploiera toutes ses ambitions, ses talents de développeur, ses qualités de travailleur assidu.

Symbole de patriotisme et d’abnégation pour son pays, celui qui rêvait de grandeur pour le Bénin, selon beaucoup de témoignages, l’homme au parcours très bref mais très riche sera mort « trop tôt » comme ledit l’auteur. Et c’est avec beaucoup d’émotion que ses anciens compagnons et collaborateurs encore vivants, comme Dr Amidou Baba-Moussa (préfacier du livre), Robert Dossou, Théophile Nata, Colonel Philippe Akpo, Général Mama Sika… se sont relayés, remuant leur mémoire, pour dire ce qu’ils avaient encore en souvenir de l’homme.  Toute chose qui n’a fait que renforcer et justifier la démarche de l’auteur, Edouard Loko, actuellement vice-président de la Haute autorité de l’audio-visuel et de la communication (HAAC). « Abdoulaye Issa, Trop tôt à Setto » est le second livre du journaliste, ex-président de l’Observatoire de la déontologie et de l’éthique dans les médias (ODEM), après « L’intrus qui connaissait la maison ».

Bild Online

Did you know that one of the founders of the International Institute for Journalism (IIJ), Axel Springer, founded Europe’s most successful paper, Bild in 1952?

With a circulation of more than three million, Bild is the biggest German tabloid newspaper and one of the 230 newspapers and magazines published by the Axel Springer publishing house. There is also a Sunday edition called Bild am Sontag with even more pictures than Bild and its own editorial team. Sometimes there is a healthy competition among these two editions, too.

Bild editors sometimes seem to try to make pictures say more than words and the paper features a lot of colour photos of politicians and celebrities.

“Pictures do have a major influence. Here is never a story without picture and there are often pictures without stories.” Kai Feldhaus, chief reporter of Bild in Berlin said.

There is a sports desk for for Bild, Bild am Sonntag and online. Saturdays is football league day and everyone wants to see the latest news in the Sunday edition, that’s why the sports section in this newspaper plays a good role.

Bild is also famous for its pictures of half-naked young women on the front page. At the end of every year there is a Bild “Girl of the Year” contest between those women, and the winner is awarded a cash prize.

With the rise of online media, Bild has also developed a website, bild.de. Online and print reporters and editors collaborate in the newsroom, Mr Feldhaus told the participants of this year’s IIJ Summer Academy. He added that while the bild.de can publish the news faster, the print version often has exclusive and more in-depth content.

Mr Feldhaus said that being honest is one of the keys for success of the paper. He added that a recent survey shows that Bild has 12 million readers in Germany.

There are complaints against Bild for committing mistakes without correcting them. Mr. Feldhaus said that they make mistakes and things are corrected. However, he is not sure if they have done it as wisely as it should be.

Although Mr Feldhaus was harshly criticized by his friends and family for working with the “evil newspaper”, he is proud and happy working in such organisation because, as he says, the newspaper is very successful so that they pay decent money and have enough resources to do journalism.

“They send people to where things happen. They don’t wait another five days because there are cheaper flights. They are not using slave freelance workers who got paid a few bucks.”

“That’s the way that I’ve always dreamt of journalism to be.”

Nowadays, dpa is the biggest news agency in Germany and one of the leading news agencies worldwide with an extensive network of bureaus and correspondents. It faces tough competition from other news agencies such as AP, AFP and Reuter Thomson, but its worldwide operation delivers news to print media, radio, television, online media and mobile phones in German, English, Spanish and Arabic. So far, it has more than 2500 customers in a hundred countries. 

Mr Romanczyk believes that for its German clients, dpa has the advantage that is covers international affairs from a German perspective or what the news editor calls “through German glasses”. 

But while dpa is the leading press agency in Germany, the popularity of online news is a growing challenge for dpa. Because especially younger people turn away from print media, the circulation of many newspapers in Germany is on a downward spiral – a growing threat for news agencies who earn their money with selling news to other media organisations. 

In order to stand out in this tough climate, dpa editors are constantly thinking of innovations to keep the agency’s leading position in the media market. 

Mr Romanczyk said that more or less older people in Germany are reading newspaper. One of the latest innovations is a children’s news desk that produces, for example, stories for the kids’ pages of several German newspapers – a new initiative to make newspapers attractive for children and thus foster new readers. Mr Romanczyk claimed that about half of all German newspapers publish a page exclusively for kids at least once a week.  

Mr Romanczyk pointed out that writing for children is not as easy a job as it might sometimes sound, because it is a challenge to explain, for example, the recent earthquake and nuclear accident in Japan to children.

Another innovation dpa has introduced is a new communications system that allowes clients – editors and reporters of other media organisations – to communicate directly with the agency’s newsroom in the centre of Berlin. It gives the agency’s staff  the opportunity to speak directly to its customers and answer their questions about dpa stories.

While Der Spiegel has seen reasonable growth since its inception in 1947, one reporter of the magazine, Petra Bornhoeft, admited all is not well given the multiple choices people now have when it comes to accessing news.

Ms Bornhoeft said the publication still reaches close to six million people with 1.1 million copies.

But she admitted the rise of the Internet has not made life easier for the magazine amid fears that future generations will opt for digital products.

Ms Bornhoeft, like many other journalists in Germany, believes that it is now time for newspapers and magazines to connect to other businesses because the the Internet is posing a serious threat.

“Der Spiegel has to look for new business areas related to journalism because of the Internet. It’s a problem for many publications in Germany.”

Although she acknowledged that the magazine lost advertisements last year, she said the publication was still one of the leading weeklies in Europe.

However, Der Spiegel is not popular in the eastern parts of Germany for two reasons.

“People in the east cannot afford (the price),” Ms Bornhoeft told participants of this year’s IIJ Summer Academy.

The reporter added that some East Germans are also fed up with reading revelations about the former East German secret police, the Stasi. “They say it’s in the past – but we say no, we have to know about the past, because we might have no future if we ignore it,” she said.

Asked how the paper has managed to survive although it’s critical journalism is often uncomfortable for politicians, Ms Bornhoeft said:  “Credibility depends on the truth. I can’t imagine working, for example, in Zimbabwe, where there is no freedom of expression.”

When he started WikiLeaks in 2006, Julian Assange believed in the power of original, unedited material. He assumed such documents would achieve that “readers and historians alike can see evidence of the truth,” as stated on the  website. Back then the site only published original material and short summaries.

After three years of sharing a lot of valuable material on the website and not getting much attention from either the mainstream media and the public, Mr. Assange changed his strategy.

In spring 2010, a 2007 video from Baghdad – in which an US Apache helicopter fired on and killed civilians – marked the first turning point: Julian Assange presented it at a press conference.

“WikiLeaks adopted a more journalistic approach — editing and annotating,” David Carr, media columnist with the New York Times, wrote in December 2010. The disclosure of the video gained much more attention from the press.

A new player

Starting in July 2010, WikiLeaks began its partnership with some established news outlets by providing them with a massive amount of classified US government documents related to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

WikiLeaks shared the material with several well-known publications, including the British Guardian, the New York Times, German magazine Der Spiegel, El Pais (Spain) and Le Monde (France). They later also published the classified diplomatic cables of the correspondence between the US State Department and US embassies all over the world.

Julian Assange was heavily criticised within WikiLeaks for turning away from its core philosophy, said Marcel Rosenbach of Der Spiegel. Mr. Rosenbach was involved in the co-operation between the magazine and WikiLeaks and has written the book “WikiLeaks – Enemy of the State”.

“It was not so much WikiLeaks that had a great impact on traditional journalism. It was more the traditional media that changed WikiLeaks over the course of 2010,” Mr. Rosenbach told young journalists from Asia and Africa at this year’s IIJ Summer Academy in Hamburg.

However, he added that the journalism world also has changed due to “the new player in the field.”

According to Mr. Rosenbach, there was an agreement between the five publications for simultaneous publication of the internationally relevant documents, but each newspaper chose topics that connected to their specific audience. It has been the first time ever some giant competitors in the global media industry worked closely together to analyse and publish such important stories, Mr. Rosenbach said.

“This kind of cooperation alone was quite fascinating, and it’s something new that hasn’t been there before,” Mr. Rosenbach said.

He added that after the WikiLeaks reports, the papers have also cooperated in some other cases.

Mr. Rosenbach pointed out that WikiLeaks has inspired many newsrooms across the world to think about establishing their own safe digital platforms where whistleblowers can safely post material.

“Any news outlet has to think about the way to communicate with sources and how to keep sources secured in the digital environment,” he added.

He also said that in some countries, which have strict media laws, traditional journalists may send their reports to WikiLeaks as a publishing platform because it is “international and uncensorable.”

History has the duty to record their actions- those responsible for the arrest of Chief Manneh. The evil or good that many do may be buried with their bones. However, there are those whose evil and good deeds live after them. There are those who live at the expense of others and spread mischief on earth, such people are never remembered with found memories, such are the cursed of the earth.
There are those who live to safeguard the interest of others and those are the ones who could be remember for ever. Chief Manneh as he is fondly called live to safeguard the interest of others especially the voice of the voiceless by joining the noble profession (journalism).
The first anniversary of Chief Manneh was held Tuesday 17 July 2007, organised by the Network of Human Rights Journalists (NHRJ), funded by the American Embassy in Banjul. The well attended symposium was held at the Alliance Franco Gambienne. Despite the torrential rains that very day, the hall was full to
capacity with journalists, civil rights groups and the family members of the missing journalist from around the country.
However, no governmental official graced the occasion after NHRJ wrote to the then Secretary of State for Information and Communication Technology Mrs. Nenneh Macdonal- Gaye, former Secretary of State for Justice Mr. Kebba Sanyang who is now a private legal practitioner, Director of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) and the Inspector General of Police, who all failed to honour NHRJ’s invitation.
As a General Assignment Reporter in my early days and who have the opportunity to participate and cover the event for The Gambia News and Report Weekly Magazine, the symposium on missing journalist was held
successful despite government officials boycotted the symposium.
The symposium dubbed ‘” Guarantee to Freedom of the Press in The Gambia” and was chaired by Mr. Sam Sarr, Editor, Foroyaa Newspaper who at the symposium expressed sympathy to the families of Chief Manneh. Sam Sarr adds; ” for a journalist to disappeared for more than one year is a total violation of his fundamental rights. He also expressed delight that the media fraternity has not forgot Chief Manneh adding that efforts are been made to secure his immediate release but to no availed.
Kudos to NHRJ, as since the disappearance of Chief Manneh, the network that is an organised group of journalists committed to the promotion and protection of human and peoples’ rights, to restore, defend, and
promote freedom, justice and democracy has been in fore front in the campaign for the release of Chief Manneh.
It is suffice to say that with all the provisions, among many others guaranteeing human rights and freedom of expression, ” it is sad that Chief has been missing for five years now in our own society and up to
date we cannot know his whereabouts.” Chief Manneh at the time of his arrest, he was exercising his
fundamental rights of freedom of expression. His continuous detention tantamount total violation of his fundamental rights and is unacceptable.
His continuous detention, and with the continuous violence against journalists in The Gambia provoke commitments to our own designed and ratified laws.
President Jammeh, it’s time for your government to release Chief Manneh as well as to compensate his family a compensation of US$100,000.00. President Jammeh, release Chief Manneh so as for him to rejoins with his braved family. “We missed Chief Manneh and the alarm bell has ring for us to kiss him.”
Sarjo Manneh father of Chief Manneh at the one year anniversary of his son told the forum that sine the disappearance of his son, the family has sleepless night, he urged all Muslims to join hands and pray for
him to see his son. He adds: ” I have strong faith in Allah if not I will go mad,” sarjo
Manneh told the forum.
For Sula Ceesay Chief Manneh’s mother,has this to say ” I prayed to Allah to protect my son wherever he might be detained.”
Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression in Africa Article 4 (3) on Freedom of Information reads ” Public bodies hold information not for themselves but as custodians of the public good and everyone has a right to access this information, subject only to clearly defined rules established by law.
Therefore, the public bodies that are holding the information on Chief Manneh, it’s long over due to give the information about him, we need information on Chief Manneh, help us as custodians of information
especially the security apparatus.
Again, Article 4 (3) reads ” Everyone has the right to access and update or otherwise correct their personal information, whether it is held by public or by private bodies”. So it incumbent on both public
and private bodies to update us (journalists) on Chief Manneh’s whereabouts.
As the government is duty bond to protect the lives of its citizens, President Jammeh the alarm bell has ring for the release of Chief Manneh.

But a private prosecutor in the massacre case says De Lima’s assurances are empty should Ampatuan be accepted as a state witness and enrolled in her department’s Witness Protection Program.

This is because the law, or more specifically, Republic Act 6981, “An Act Providing for a Witness Protection, Security and Benefit Program and for Other Purposes,” a witness placed under the state’s protection program should be immediately taken to a “secure housing facility” until he or she has finished testifying or “until the threat, intimidation or harassment disappears or is reduced to a manageable or tolerable level.”

“The safe house can be anywhere, it can even be in Forbes Park,” private prosecutor Harry Roque said.

Ampatuan could very well invoke this should he be taken into the WPP for the electoral fraud case since he has publicly pointed to his father, Andal Sr., and brother, Andal Jr., who are also accused principals in the massacre case, of being the real masterminds of the mass murder of 58 persons, including 32 media workers.

Continue Reading here