State of the media in Southern Africa - 2003 Unlike the independent press, which burst onto the scene during political transition in the early 1990, independent broadcasting was born out of struggle and controversy. Today scores of community radio stations are widespread in both urban and rural areas. Unfortunately, many of these are shoestring operations that broadcast predominantly music, while transmission radius is highly restricted. Generally, there has been a steady decline in the development of the private media sector. Financial problems have caused many newspapers to operate below capacity. In June 2003, the Monitor newspaper reduced its frequency from a bi-weekly to a weekly while the weekly Today newspaper’s circulation has not been consistent, coming out once every fortnight or not coming out at all. Independent media free from government and monopolistic control is critical if the country is to achieve the greatest possible diversity and a key to the sustainability of democratic systems. The independent media in its present form does not contribute much to the democratic process, as it is not able to act as a courier of alternative viewpoints nor to question government policies and expose abuse of power and corruption. The current high concentration of ownership of the mainstream media by government has grossly undermined media diversity, thereby significantly contributing to the media’s failure to reflect the full spectrum of multi-party and pluralistic views which are critical to press freedom and democracy. The excessive damages and costs awarded by courts in cases involving the media are beginning to be a source of concern and most of these are coming from government officials and politicians. These fines and damages create the impression that the courts are out to gag the private media. The High Court in Zambia early this year awarded K80 million (US $18 000) to two Commissioners of the Permanent Human Rights Commission for libel. The Court passed a ruling in absentia in favour of the commissioners following an article in the Monitor newspaper that alleged that the commissioners had accepted a ‘bribe’ from relatives of a young man who had inherited estates from the deceased’s father. The commissioners subsequently engaged court bailiffs and expropriated the Monitor’s editorial vehicle, a Land Rover station wagon, thereby paralysing the operations of the newsroom. MISA-Zambia and PAZA continue to work together in the fight for greater press freedom in Zambia. The two organisations fought many ‘battles’ together during the year especially on the call for legal reforms. Both MISA-Zambia and PAZA on various fora urged government to scrap 13 bad pieces of law including the Official Secrets Act that inhibits press freedom. On a positive note, government scored successes towards the end of the year when on December 23, 2003 it unveiled the long awaited Information and Communications Technology (ICT) draft policy. Until then, Zambia was among a few countries in the SADC region that had no ICT policy. It is clear that a greater struggle lies ahead in Zambia’s fight for media freedom. There is an urgent need to convince the New Deal Administration to undertake legal media reforms that will guarantee press freedom and foster democracy for the Zambian people. So This Is Democracy? 2003 102 Media Institute of Southern Africa