By JENERALI ULIMWENGU

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As is customary, the Tanzania media fraternity celebrated World Press Freedom Day (WPFD) this past week in Dodoma with a number of calls for the improvement of media working conditions in various aspects.

This important day, May 3, was decided upon by the United Nations at a meeting which took place in Windhoek, Namibia, in 1993, in recognition of the importance of the work done by media and media workers, and the need to pay attention to the conditions in which they evolve and the tribulations they have to endure.

As is the wont of such occasions, the activities involved many speeches, mainly from news people, their editors and publishers complaining about the conditions in which they are forced to work.

It was, however, not just a litany of jeremiads, for they also came up with what could be done to make the situation better. A number of suggestions were proposed to the government — the principal “usual suspect” in these matters — to rectify the situation.

Read: ULIMWENGU: You killed journalism, now live with the result

There was much to be said thereon, because the media environment in this country has been slipping from bad to worse, and it seems the downward slide is continuing apace. During the meetings held in the new capital, Dodoma, it was remarked on a number of occasions that serious media in Tanzania is dead and buried, and that the only salvation that one could hope for would be resuscitation.

It is important to state at this juncture that the situation was not as dire, as it sounds today, in the recent past. Indeed, in the wake of the effervescence of multiparty politics in the early 1990s, Tanzania witnessed the mushrooming of more or less serious media organs coming to the fore, contributing to the public discourse and raising the bar of the political and social conversations that flourished among a large section of the populace.

It was during this period that we saw a vibrant and mordant media taking on whoever and whatever was perceived as inimical to the interests of the public, be they state agents or powerful corporate bodies. We witnessed the spectre of government ministers being forced to resign their positions because of media accusations, and commercial bigwigs forced to own up for their nefarious activities in pursuit of the profit motive.

That was in the halcyon days, when our media set the agenda for every thing we did, from politics, to business, to sports… to everything. And one felt comfortable in one’s skin because things went well: Periodically scoundrels would be exposed and the public good would be served, a sense of psychological wellness restored.

It was the time when Ali Hassan Mwinyi, a rather quiet, unassuming Mswahili gentleman, was the top dog in the country. He did not saddle himself with complicated political pseudo ideologies and complicated thought processes, which many African statesmen seem to think they need to validate themselves.

Mwinyi was about doing what was clearly trying to do right by his people, essentially relying on a battery of able civil servants to guide him in what he intended to do with his presidency. The healthy political atmosphere created under Mwinyi engendered the vibrant media scene I have described above.

But soon things changed, after Mwinyi left office and his office was taken over by those who thought they knew better than others. These new rulers had inimical relations with the media, and they made sure that the improvement of the media scene started by Mwinyi stalled and later petered out altogether.

Read: ULIMWENGU: Mwinyi had faults but a man with heart

So, just as we failed to register any real progress in the political sphere under Mwinyi’s successors, Benjamin Mkapa and Jakaya Kikwete, we lost the momentum we had experienced in media under Mwinyi, the former of the two wanting to keep the press quiet on state officials’ thievery, and the latter more lackadaisical in too many issues.

All this set the stage for John Magufuli, who came to State House after Kikwete, to do away with any vestiges of a press that thought it was free, alongside any remaining pretence of multiparty politics. It was the openly declared position of this president not to brook any divergent opinions and to make sure all political opposition was dead and all “free media” was dead and buried.

That is where we are today as we mark this year’s WPFD and as our practitioners are voicing demands for the betterment of their working conditions. Many of the demands voiced can be met by government, but many others lie outside the purview of government.

It is incumbent on the government — as they have promised — to look into the regulatory and legal framework that hampers media excellence and vibrancy, and for media practitioners organised in their various professional organisations themselves to do the rest, including weeding out the more nefarious elements in media who practically do media no favour in terms of public perception and support.

On this last point it is important to note that WPFD celebrations every year involve only media practitioners and government, as the two sides of a media problematic. However, I believe the public — about whom press freedom should really be concerned — just watch and say little. The only reason media should be made free to do its work is the public.

So, where is the public?