THE Federation of African Media Women in Zimbabwe (FAMWZ) has accused the media of prioritising gender-related news articles only in the run-up, during and shortly after the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence (GBV) which start today.
WONAI MASVINGISE,SENIOR REPORTER
FAMWZ said it had carried a baseline study which revealed that the media tends to highlight gender-related issues during the period leading to the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence and neglects the subject thereafter.
According to the report titled Measuring Progress: Media and Gender Before and Beyond the 16 Days Campaign of Activism Against Gender Based Violence, it was observed that gender-related issues were given prominence in the media between November 25 and December 11.
“While the media carried 88 reports on gender-related issues, the majority of their 1 079 reports on other topics like politics, business, economy et cetera made no effort to explore gender as a cross-cutting and underlying factor to every issue,” reads part of the report.
“Furthermore, the coverage of gender issues in just 8% of content compared to the avalanche of gender aware stories during the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Based Violence demonstrates that the media largely wakes up to these issues as a societal concern during the 10-day commemoration and thereafter continues with business as usual.”
The report noted that during the 16-day period when GBV is put under the spotlight, there are more women voices in the media than during any other period, but women’s voices were still not as loud as their male counterparts.
“Although the women were quoted more than men during the period reviewed, in some instances women are still more likely to be ‘seen’ than heard. These reports portrayed women as passive, as a constituency to be seen, but not heard. This was mostly evident in reports about women, but which ultimately fail to give them a voice to express themselves. This is in contrast to the 16 Days campaign where women were mostly heard expressing themselves in line with the theme,” FAMWZ said.
