Namibia
of equal participation of both sexes in the production process is
mixed. While the staff of the NBC German service and The Namibian
is predominantly female, most of the media houses (notably the NBC
in general, Allgemeine Zeitung, Die Republikein and the Windhoek
Observer) are dominated by white men. Their staff complement is
so small (less than 25), however, that they fall below the radar of
affirmative action reports.
There is a sense that there have been areas of progress around gender mainstreaming in the media, but there are no official, in-house
policies in this regard.
All the country’s newspaper editors are men, except for Gwen Lister
of The Namibian. The Namibian appears to be particularly genderbalanced: the complement of journalists working on the daily comprises four female and four male reporters.
SCORES:
Individual scores:

2, 2, 4, 4, 3, 4, 4, 3, 3

Average score:

3.2

4.5

(2005 = 3)

Gender mainstreaming is reflected in the editorial content.

ANALYSIS:
During the last two years there have been no new national or regional studies specifically on gender and the media. In 2005, there
was a follow-up to the MISA-Genderlinks Gender and Media Baseline
Study of 2003, but this was broader in scope and looked not only at
the media’s coverage of gender but of HIV and AIDS as well.
There is little reflection on gender mainstreaming in the editorial
policies of newspapers, as well as in editorials and opinion pieces.
African Media Barometer - Namibia 2007

45

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