Reporters wait for a press conference at the Ministry of Information, Communication Technology and Postal Services, on Friday, July 5, 2024 📸(Lou Nelson/Eye Radio)

JUBA, South Sudan (Eye Radio) – A new media monitoring report confirms that South Sudan’s media sector has significantly increased its professional standards over recent months, scoring high marks across crucial journalistic metrics.

The report, conducted by Digital Rights Frontline and Journalists for Human Rights (JHR), analyzed content from various radio, television, newspaper, and website outlets broadcast between July and August of this year.

Addressing South Sudan’s editors on Thursday, November 13, Digital Rights Frontline researcher Jackson Ochaya highlighted the study’s focus: measuring key indicators of ethical practice, professional standards, and gender gaps in media coverage.

Strong Consistency in Core Ethics

Key baseline survey findings indicate that news organizations demonstrated strong consistency in three major areas of professionalism:

1. Credible Information: Content largely relied on verifiable facts and trustworthy sources.
2. Attribution: Journalists clearly cited sources and provided necessary context for claims, leading to very low instances of misinformation.
3. Story Balance: Media outlets showed better representation of multiple viewpoints on complex issues.

Ochaya pointed out that these high scores suggest local media outlets are increasingly adhering to professional journalistic principles, a vital step toward building public trust and ensuring citizens receive accurate information.

Challenges and Recommendations

Despite the positive trends, the report identified several operational and editorial challenges, along with actionable recommendations:

Operational and Editorial Challenges

• Irregular Publishing: Some media houses demonstrated irregular publishing schedules, particularly on weekends, affecting the continuity and comprehensiveness of news coverage.
• Technical Issues: Certain online news platforms experienced temporary outages during the monitoring period, limiting access to their content.
• Translation Gaps: Arabic news bulletins sometimes included English statements without translation, making interpretation difficult for Arabic-speaking audiences.
• Access Barriers: Journalists continue to face challenges accessing information, which hinders balanced and comprehensive reporting.
• Editorial Errors: Some news outlets contained editorial errors, making it difficult for readers to fully understand the content.
• Low Content Diversity: Some Arabic newspapers occasionally published multiple stories on the same event from similar angles, reducing content diversity.

The Persistent Gender Gap

The report highlights that the underrepresentation of women remains a significant challenge. Women in senior positions, whether in government or private sectors, were rarely quoted as subject-matter experts or featured in discussions of policies, programs, or institutional initiatives.

Key Recommendations

To address these issues, the report provided the following recommendations:

• Consistent Scheduling: Media outlets should establish and adhere to a consistent publishing schedule, including weekend editorial planning.
• Technical Investment: Media houses should invest in reliable website hosting, maintenance, and backup solutions to ensure uninterrupted online access.
• Source Diversity: Media houses should actively seek out and include female experts in reporting, developing a database of women specialists across sectors to support gender-inclusive reporting.
• Editorial Review: Strengthen editorial review processes, including fact-checking and copy-editing, and offer training programs to further reduce errors.
• Government Transparency: Government agencies and institutions should adopt transparent communication protocols and provide timely access to information to improve reporting quality.
• Broadcasting Standards: Broadcasters should ensure all content is delivered in the target language or provide real-time translation to enhance audience comprehension.

Conclusion

Compared with previous surveys, the findings indicate a notable improvement in news content credibility, with minimal instances of false information, unverified claims, stereotypes, and gender-biased assumptions recorded.

However, the underrepresentation of women remains a significant challenge that limits gender diversity in news narratives. Addressing this gap is essential to ensuring more inclusive and representative reporting in the local media.