By Mada Augustine Ngombu
The Media Reform Coordinating Group Sierra Leone (MRCG-SL) has with its partner organization African Transitional Justice Legacy Fund (ATJLF), held a regional training of journalists on transitional justice that will enable them to report on issues that will help prevent a repeat of events such as the August 10 violence ahead of the upcoming 2023 elections.
As such, this is to engage the media and communities to change the narratives of transitional justice issues that also led to the 11 years civil war in Sierra Leone.
According to the National Coordinator of MRCG, Dr. Francis Sowa, Sierra Leone has transitional justice mechanisms that were used at the end of the war but that concerns have been raised as to the occurrence of such issues that are retrogressing the practice, noting that media practitioner have not been adequately reporting on transitional justice issues.
He said the training is to change the narratives of transitional justice issues by working with the media to report and also engage in community meetings.
“So the second part where this project works is in the Mile 91 community where Radio Gbaft is engaged in doing monthly radio programmes on transitional justice as well as having community engagements in that part of the country,” Dr. Sowa said.
He added: “They have had the training in Bo for journalists in the southern and eastern regions, Makeni, for journalists in the north and north-west region and journalists in the west. The next part of engaging in the transitional discourse is to put together a team of mentees that will be working with mentors to produce stories on transitional justice. That is why they called journalists to equip them with the necessary knowledge and skills to report on transitional justice.”
Lecturer and Head of Media and Communications at the University of Sierra Leone, Dr. Tonya Musa who was one of the trainers, stated that it is vital to journalists because it would help them to generate contents and look at transitional justice issues but that if they fail to communicate these issues as journalists, Sierra Leone would slowly descend into another civil war.
“By merely communicating the past can serve as a way to solve the present and prevent reoccurrence without punitive actions and the idea of transitional justice training is to address impunity,” Dr. Musa noted.
The President of SLAJ, Ahmed Sahid Nasralla, in his statement thanked MRCG and ATJLF for organizing such a training for journalists.
“It is the role of the media in doing so, and the purpose of the training is to enhance journalists with knowledge and experience and awareness of the truth and reconciliation commission recommendations,” Nasralla said.
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