Thursday, March 28, 2024

PF still dominating public media coverage ahead of polls-Report

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File: A ZNBC outside broadcast van
File: A ZNBC outside broadcast van
The second media monitoring report released by MISA Zambia shows that overall, the PF received significantly more coverage across all the four public media outlets than any of the other political parties.

The research was conducted from 23rd May to 29th June 2016 and specifically focuses on four public media outlets, namely ZNBC TV, ZNBC Radio 2, The Times of Zambia and Zambia Daily Mail.

The party with the second most coverage was the UPND but the coverage was half the amount of the coverage given to the PF party.

Other political parties received less than 10% coverage across the four media outlets.

This trend is similar to what was observed in the pre-election period media monitoring exercise.

The research also shows that the coverage of the MMD party, which is not competing in the presidential race, surpassed most of the other political parties participating in the presidential elections.

“In terms of the nature of coverage, the UPND party received more explicitly negative coverage compared to either the MMD party or the PF party, which consistently received more neutral or explicitly positive coverage,” the report says.

“On ZNBC TV 1 the PF party received nearly five times as much coverage (56%) as the next most covered party (UPND, with 12%).Furthermore, the MMD party, without a presidential candidate in this year’s election, received more coverage (9%) than other political parties who are actively involved in the presidential elections, such as UPP (5%), FDD (2%), Rainbow (2%), UNIP (2%) and the Green party (2%).”

It shows that the MMD had 88%) and UPP party received 80% more explicitly positive coverage than any other party while the UPND at 29% had the least number of explicitly positive stories on ZNBC TV.

Other political parties received a significant amount of neutral coverage for the majority of their stories.

The report also shows that election campaigns at 39% and election related violence at 8% including political alliances at 7% were the most covered key themes by ZNBC TV 1 during the monitored campaign period.

The report also shows that female candidates have not been allocated enough space during the election campaign.
“Across the 4 media outlets monitoring approximately 77% of coverage was devoted to male candidates and personalities. ZNBC TV1 stands outs with a fairly balanced gender coverage.”

The report which was authored by MISA Zambia, the Media Liaison Committee with technical support from BBC Media Action recommended increased coverage and discussion on topics relevant to the population so that the electorate can make an informed choice.

It also called for balance of coverage for the different political players in 2016 tripartite elections noting that that the heavy bias towards the PF should be balanced with a more equitable and fair coverage of the other political parties.

It also wants increased points of view, multiple voices and perspectives to ensure that a diversity of views is represented and increased coverage of women players in the tripartite elections.

13 COMMENTS

    • What do you expect Ba LT when even yourselves are BIASED?!

      PF as a ruling violent party can assumedly be “dominating public media coverage” ONLY Dead’ NBC TV & Radio, Daily Mail including Times of Zambia for they are public entities. These public media outlets have been biasedly been misused by the anarchical PF minions!
      PF can be famous on social media b’coz majority of people want to witness PF’s mediocrity. LT & Daily Nation have turned into PFs propagandas’ emblems of supporting primitivism when many Zambians are suffering absolute hunger & poverty.
      The economy is rotten under blood thirsty PF bandits of visionless Lungu cheating people to “National Fasting & Prayer” when it in fact, punching & fighting.
      On 11~8 vote wisely Forward for an economist HH & NOT Lungu who is…

    • …..taking the economics of the country in reverse. Dununa reverse is indeed BACKWARDNESS.

      25 Days of voting wisely left & a fantastic opportunity for Zambians to show the violent & visionless PF of Lungu the exit window.
      If you vote for viewless PF then hunger, poverty & suffering substantially will be your food to pillow. Otherwise vote for progressive ideologies & professionalalized UPND not PF bandits.
      Lungu =Economic Crisis & in Reverted, whilst Hero of Humanity HH=Economic Growth & best life.
      Vote Wisely for HH & UPND on 11~8 for Economic Prosperity.
      The Skeleton Key
      ~206~

  1. @ skeleton don’t be naive, if there an online media in Zambia is Lusaka times. They bring the news as it comes not this evil project called ZWD Which is bent on malice & insults on people with divergent views

  2. Thanks MISA, I love stats from any research, a quantitative analysis to me is less biased than a qualitative one. The numbers speak for themselves. I hope the incoming UPND government does not also fall into this trap of ‘cover-me-only’ syndrome by all previous governments. We shall keep a critical eye on the incoming President HH as well. We need to reboot and start afresh as a country from August onward.

  3. IT IS THE FIRST TIME IN ZAMBIA’S HISTORY TO SEE SO MUCH BIASED COVERAGE FROM PUBLIC MEDIA. NAMES LIKE MWANZA AT ZNBC, CHULU ECZ WERE PUT IN THOSE POSITIONS STRATEGICALLY TO ENSURE FULL ABUSE (WAKO NI WAKO NONSENSE). ONE THING U FORGET IS THAT MAJORITY OF US TAX PAYERS WHOSE MONEY U ARE USING DON NOT AGREE WITH YOUR BOSS’S STYLE OF LEADERSHIP. MAJORITY OF HIS SUPPORTERS ARE IN THE STREETS WHERE THEY DO NOT EVEN CONTRIBUTE ANY FORM OF TAX

  4. MY WORD OF ADVICE TO THE PUBLIC MEDIA IS, IF YOU CAN NOT COVER SOME CITIZENS ON THE GOOD THINGS THEY DO, PLEASE DON NOT COVER THEM EVEN WHEN IT COMES TO NEGATIVES. STOP ATTACKING INNOCENT CITIZENS WHOM U HAVE NOT ACCORDED CHANCE TO DEFEND THEMSELVES. U ONCE TOLD US THAT HH WAS A SHAREHOLDER IN SATURINA REGINA BUT WHEN THEN TRUTH CAME OUT, DID U APOLOGIZE FOR YOUR MISINFORMATION? SHAME ON U PUBLIC MEDIA EMPLOYEES

  5. I THINK THERE IS SUCH A TERM AS “NEWS-WORTHINESS”. SOME POLITICAL PARTIES DO NOT DESERVE TO BE REPORTED ON. WHAT NEWS-WORTHY TOPICS DO THEY GENERATE? FOR ADVERTS, THEY ARE PAID FOR. THEY SAY “WHEN YOU PAY, IT WILL SHOW”. THE OPPOSITION IS WELL COVERED BY MUVI TV, ZWD, POST, ZAMBIAN EYE ETC.

  6. How can PF not get the majority of coverage when they dictate what and who should be on air. Intimidation by going to media houses and stopping coverage, making threats by C.hi Chimbwili etc. This is not fair politics but biased ones and PF knows it. Speaking of fairness Lusaka Times you need to be fair when it comes to peoples comments. You are very selective it seems and comments with knowledge and strong points if they compromise PF you don’t publish why? Many times people have complained and you need to respect peoples wishes. We know you are for PF but remember freedom of expression is a right to hold opinions without interference.

  7. Why do you call them public media? They don’t do anything in the public interest. Perhaps Just say state owned media

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