My nightmare as BBC Network Africa editor – Joseph Warungu

It’s actually a great privilege and honour that I was able to achieve that and it’s kind of a recognition that African journalism has really advanced and we’ve made our presence felt inside the BBC. So I was really, really pleased with that. It’s also a big challenge. I remember when I took the job […]

It’s actually a great privilege and honour that I was able to achieve that and it’s kind of a recognition that African journalism has really advanced and we’ve made our presence felt inside the BBC. So I was really, really pleased with that. It’s also a big challenge. I remember when I took the job a few years ago, it felt as if you had the responsibility of the whole continent on your shoulders and I have tried my best to make sure I have not let the whole continent down.

In the seven years you have been in charge, what have been the challenges?

I think there have been several. One has been to try and make sure the BBC – because before it was only available on short wave – that the BBC can be heard on FM, our listeners can hear us on good quality on FM, which means working with my BBC business development colleagues to secure FM partnership, FM frequencies. And we have done that in many countries except Nigeria, which still remains a challenge; Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia and even South Africa. These are places we are not there yet partly because of the regulations and that sort of things. So that has been one of the big challenges. I think the second one has been to try and bring up a new breed of African journalists. Before, for a long time, if you go to big countries, even like Nigeria, you had foreign correspondents from the BBC who work in these countries for the BBC, but over the last few years we have introduced Nigerians trying to tell their own stories. If it’s in Kenya, you have Kenyan journalists and that makes a difference. I think if African stories are told by Africans, they make a bigger impact. That has been one of my challenges and I think it has been quite successful, including even the recruitment of presenters and staff in London. Out of our team for example, I think we have three Nigerians; Balkisu Labaran, Peter Okwocha, Bola Mosuro and others from other parts of the continent; Kenya, Uganda. So that too was another challenge. And the last one is the usual one; making sure that we are not silenced by any authorities in places where freedom of expression and freedom of the media is limited. We have always tried to stand by our editorial principles which have always been about balance and impartiality and fairness.

You mentioned Africans telling their own stories; it seems you have been having a little problem with your reporter in Zimbabwe, have you sorted that out?

We actually did. We have an African correspondent there who works for the African Service, he’s called Brian Hungwe and interestingly enough, zimbabawe is opening up. As we speak, Zimbabwe government has begun accrediting journalists there. it was quite difficult before because the Zimbabwe authorities did not allow foreigners, even the BBC, to be present in that country but when we came up with a really good journalist who is Zimbabwean himself, they had no answer to that and they have allowed accreditation and he still reports for us.

He was having problems being reaccredited, has that been sorted out?

It’s being sorted out as we speak. It was difficult but I think they have already accredited one of the journalists who work for us and he is the second one who will be accredited. So I believe it will be resolved, it’s not something that we are worried about.

Have you been facing these difficulties elsewhere?

 Yes. There are other countries, even though they eventually allow you, it’s always difficult to get a correspondent. For example, in Ethiopia, we’ve got Uduak Amimo, she has been a producer and presenter of Focus on Africa for a number of years. She’s half Nigerian and half Kenyan but is our correspondent in Ethiopia. And it’s been a challenge to get her accredited and allowed to report in the country but we’ve been able to overcome that. The place where we have a real difficulty is Gambia; it’s not safe at all to have a reporter. A lot of journalists, not just for the BBC, have fled Gambia. Most of them are in Senegal or other parts of West Africa or even abroad. It’s too dangerous with the regime on ground to have a reporter there. We had a reporter whose house was attacked. It was never clear who it was but it looked like the work of security forces or people who were sympathetic to the government and just because he dared to report the truth. So Gambia has been a very difficult environment to report in for anybody. It’s very, very dangerous.

So what has the weight been like knowing that you have people in the field whose lives are at risk on a daily basis?

That is always my nightmare. Apart from Gambia we have Somalia as well. We have a correspondent called Mohamed Olad Hassan, who has actually won a very prestigious award in the UK – the Speaker Abbott Award in Defence of Democracy, because even when a lot of reporters left Somalia because of the dangers, he continued to be there. But every now and then, every two days or so, he would call me. So I’ve always got to look out for my mobile if he calls me and says he’s in trouble. It’s always the issue. When we had the war in Liberia we had to move our correspondent out to safety. So, sometimes, these are the risk you take for managing reporters in very difficult environments.

Do you actually sleep easy at nights?

(Laughs) I think now with the World Cup it’s okay, there will not be other big, serious news but when you have a war situation, conflicts, whenever you hear Somalia is boiling again, then you know you’ve got a problem in your hands. Whenever you send a team to go in and report, you know there are issues. You’ve always got to be cautious. Obviously we give people training to report in difficult environments but ultimately, you know, you just have to hope… so far we have to be thankful we’ve not had any problems or injuries or something like that. The reporter in Somalia, his house was once attacked when the government forces where fighting rebels, the house was shelled, he had shrapnel, we had to get him out and find him treatment in Nairobi. So these things are happening from time to time. Sometimes my job is to offer these reporters, would you like to come out and go to another country until it’s safe. Sometimes he says no, this is my country, I want to stay here and continue to report.

The BBC, being a government owned organization, has managed to retain its independence, how does it do that?

It’s because of the way the BBC is set up. It is true, BBC world Service gets funding from parliament, we are funded by the treasury every year to run our operations but the government never ever interferes with what we do. So I don’t need to consult anybody like the Foreign Office to say, look, we’ve got this story… even if it’s a British person that got into trouble, or there was something bad about Britain, we would report it as normal because we enjoy that level of freedom. I think the government is very weary of trying to interfere because if it did, the public would rise up in arms. And knowing that it’s the BBC that brings a lot of good reputation