Acknowledgements T his publication represents joint effort and, in particular, a collective input from various diverse media professionals and researchers in the SADC region. In the first instance we are deeply grateful to all the individual authors of the country media freedom and freedom of expression overviews for their thorough and insightful analyses. MISA’s national chapter information and advocacy officers are the face of MISA at national level - most certainly to those persons who have fallen victim to media freedom and freedom of expression violations. These are staff members who go further than document violations, and in many instances offer much-needed financial, moral and legal support to journalists. MISA and the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung’s Southern African Media Project have, since April 2005, jointly implemented the African Media Barometer (AMB) in southern Africa. The AMB is an assessment exercise done by Africans of their local media environment according to homegrown criteria. A panel of experts is formed in each country, including representatives of media and civil society at large in equal numbers. They are serving as panel members in their personal capacities, not as representatives of their respective organisations. We are deeply grateful to the various panelists for their time and insights that are reflected in the AMB reports published in this edition of So This Is Democracy? We wish to express sincere appreciation to all our partner organisations and donors who continue to contribute to this annual publication. As always, we must acknowledge and express gratitude to the International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX) in Toronto, Canada, which ensures that violations recorded by MISA in southern Africa receive maximum exposure in the international community and in doing so, allow for rapid, world-wide and coordinated response to media freedom and freedom of expression violations. The publication of this book was made possible with funding from: Royal Norwegian Embassy So This Is Democracy? 2008 -iii- Media Institute of Southern Africa