ANF in the Press

Are funders really prepared to put in the work to shift the balance of power when it comes to their giving on the continent? I am not totally convinced.

Who is to blame for the vaccine inequality that has pushed Africa to the back of the queue? The answers are not so obvious as they first seem, says Moky Makura.

How to write about Africa: A new handbook provides eight steps for the development community to share their work on the continent more ethically.

Here are some of the platforms that showcased the launch of the report.

Africa No Filter (ANF), the not-for-profit organisation focused on narrative change, has launched bird, Africa’s first, optimized-for-mobile, story agency designed to shift narratives about and within the continent.

The fictional country of Zamunda is a mixed bag of persistent stereotypes about African poverty, disease, conflict, poor leadership and hypersexual women who lack agency, all coated in Eddie Murphy’s brand of slapstick comedy that uses negative stereotypes to get easy laughs. It doesn’t add much nuance or context to the continent’s story, but it does put Africa front and center on a global stage.

Africa No Filter released the ground-breaking ‘How African Media Covers Africa’ report. The research surveyed 38 African editors, analyzed content from 60 African news outlets in 15 countries (Botswana, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe, DRC, Egypt, Tunisia, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, Ghana, Nigeria and Senegal) between September and October 2020. In addition, four facilitated focus groups were held with 25 editors of African media, editors of Pan African outlets and international correspondents.

The report was covered by traditional and digital media platforms in Africa and beyond.

Here are some of the platforms that the launch of the report.

1. CNBC Africa, Johannesburg
2. Ivoireco.com, Ivory Coast
3. Newstral, Germany
4. EIN Press Wire, Washington D.C
5. The Arab Press Agency, Morocco
6. Depechesdafrique.fr, Pan African

How do you tell the story of Africa? Moky Makura's answer is that Africa is not a story. The continent has 54 countries that are home to more than 1.2 billion people. Like the histories, languages, cultures, traditions, politics, and economies of their countries, Africans are as unique as a fingerprint. Reducing the continent to a story simply isn’t good enough.

A few weeks ago Nigeria’s leaders chose to open fire on a group of well-disciplined, extremely well-organised protestors who were demonstrating against police brutality. What was unique about this demonstration was that the protestors were largely young, educated and digitally savvy.