Ethiopia
The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia has been ranked 130 out of 180, dropping 16 places from last year, in the 2023 World Press Freedom Index(WPFI). That has placed the oldest African independent country among the 50 least favorable media environments in the world.
WPFI is a ranking of 180 countries that is published every year, thanks to the non-governmental organization (NGO) Reporters Without Borders (RSF). The index of each country is determined by available data on aggression against journalists and other media representatives in connection to their work.
The level of media freedom has significantly decreased since of last year’s ranking, according to the WPFI website. The Ethiopian media outlets are often being used as a means for the government to speak and get the information they want to the public.
After the change of government in 2018, a new era for the media environment began because for many years the information that the media could publish was extremely restricted. However in 2020, because of a still ongoing international ethnic conflict in the northern Tigray region, the newly established media freedoms did not seem to last long. Therefore, according to Reporters Without Borders, there are no significant improvements made regarding the strict media laws. Most of the broadcasting media outlets are controlled by the state.
Other than the handful of privately owned broadcasting outlets, another issue arises. The majority of the population of Ethiopia relies solely on television and radio stations when it comes to staying informed. Why would that be? Firstly, according to Human Rights Watch 80% of the population of Ethiopia lives in rural areas.
The education sector also plays a vital role in this issue. Back in 2017, the percentage of literate people was 49.7%, and after the pandemic struck in 2019 the situation just became worse. According to UNICEF reports the number of children currently out of school dropped from 3.1 million to 3.6 million in the span of six months. All of this in combination with the consequences of the civil conflicts, resulted in the biggest educational crisis Ethiopia has ever met. So that leads to the thought that press media is obviously for the literate urban elite.
Also reported by Reporters Without Borders — the government so badly wants to control the flow of information that there have been times when mobile services and the Internet have been restricted. Reports from Freedom House provide us with information that social media platforms and messaging apps have also been blocked for an unknown period without any legitimate reasoning.
An article from BBC says that the federal state has used propaganda in an attempt to control the narrative about the civil war, therefore creating mass disinformation all over social media.
The data provided by the American NGO — Freedom House annually reports the public political rights and civil liberties. It includes 210 countries and regions.
The Freedom in the World (FITW) presents the Federal Republic of Ethiopia as not a free country. Ethiopian media outlets are controlled by the state, as already mentioned, and rely solely on propaganda.
But that is not all — the government has gone as far as creating “fact-checking” platforms to shift the public’s beliefs about what is currently going on. And it is not very hard for a journalist to be sentenced wrongfully because of the “vaguely-worded” law on hate speech and disinformation, as RSF put it.
###
Borislava Mincheva is double-majoring in Journalism and Business Administration at the American University in Bulgaria. Her biggest aspiration is to be the voice for those who need it and be a small part of the change.
