SECTOR 1 published a letter by General David Sejusa, in which he claimed that certain government officials were being targeted due to their opposition to an alleged plan for the President’s son to succeed him. “Freedom of expression becomes more critical when people are experiencing these periods. Ugandans are becoming increasingly confident, and we should credit this to increased enlightenment.” “Even when there is pushback by government, people are pushing forward. People have been empowered by mobile phone technology, social media, and so forth. Their ability to express themselves has been helped by these platforms.” Generational differences also play a role in how freely Ugandans express themselves “Older people who remember the bad old days don’t want to rock the boat. They say, ‘we have peace, we can sleep, and don’t want to question the state. That group is getting old, and now we have a whole range of young people demanding what they want now.” While panellists expressed concern at some of the clampdown on the media by state authorities, some also noted the responsibility, particularly for the media, that comes with free expression in the public space. “There has been an unprecedented media explosion. They have rights, but without corresponding responsibilities. This needs to be regulated because of the pronouncements made by some media practitioners who don’t have training/ experience. In broadcasting, they go off on certain subjects, but then they say their rights are being curtailed when they are taken to task on their pronouncements.” Many radio stations have political talk shows or call-in programmes. “The average moderator is a high school graduate, with limited depth in these programmes, lack of sufficient knowledge and often times they are just non-factual. When the media have problems, it is actually because they have been professionally wrong as the journalist. They won’t have problems if they’ve got the information right. It’s the lack of skill and the lack of sufficient information. Accuracy is key. And this gets all of us into trouble.” This problem has grown to such an extent that on some stations “when broadcasters speak, they keep making disclaimers that the views being heard are not those of the owners.” “Since the experience of Central Broadcasting Station being closed in 2009 (on the accusation of instigating tribal sentiments), there are more elements of selfregulation” and it brought owners to focus more on other subjects rather than on political issues. AFRICAN MEDIA BAROMETER UGANDA 2016 15