When the video of a Tanzanian politician, Selemani Said Bungara alias Bwege went viral a couple of years ago, Kenyans went crazy with his famous utterances, ‘Uliskia Wapi?’ Personally, I use the phrase all the time when I want to verify claims people make about me.

But what it makes me remember is the times in the 90s where in order to verify and contextualize information, consumers will ask ‘Uliskia Wapi’, in order to verify the source of information. Such was the power that legacy media had, as a source of reliable information for citizens.

Currently, media consumers have various sources of information in digital spaces. However, some of these sources have been at the center of spreading mis/dis/ and malinformation.

What then is the role of media in media and information literacy?

With the increasing gap in access to information and communication technologies, and rapid expansion of internet access in Kenya, there are increased inequalities of access to quality information. Whereas there is a huge consumption of media and information from digital platforms like social media, there are still low media and information literacy levels among these consumers.

UNESCO defines Media and Information Literacy (MIL) as an interrelated set of competencies that help people to maximize advantages and minimize harm in the new information, digital and communication landscapes. MIL is about equipping citizens with the competencies and skills to engage effectively and responsibly with media and information systems.

Media and Information Literacy

Media and Information Literacy is defined by a healthy information ecosystem, a dynamic environment where communities connect with information, and the ways in which they consume, produce, contribute to, interact with, and behave around their information supply.  

Absence of a healthy information ecosystem means that communities, however different, are neither able to adequately interact with the supply chain of information, nor have an effective opportunity on their information needs (demand side of information).

The effect of an unhealthy information ecosystem is low digital media and information literacy levels. This is characterized by increased information disorder, loss of trust by the public in media, safety and security risks for journalists and dwindling media revenues as currently being experienced in Kenya.

Information disorder is collectively made up of disinformation – spreading false information with deliberate intent, misinformation – unknowing spread of false information and malinformation -spread of information that is based on reality but is used to inflict harm on a person, organization or country. Additionally, hate speech, a public speech that expresses hate or encourages violence towards a person or group based on race, religion, sex, or sexual orientation, also presents as information disorder.

When media consumers are faced with information disorder from media and other sources of information, regardless of whether or not they have media information literacy skills, they tend to lose trust in media.Media gradually losses an audience that it is meant to serve and fulfil its informational needs.

With too much inaccurate and unverifiable information flowing through the ecosystem, trust networks may break down and become partisan and polarized. In a failed system, even good, accurate information, is unable to have a significant impact.

Journalists’ safety

Recently, the safety of journalists has been at risk. Field reporters have faced harassment and attacks from the police and members of the public. During this year’s World Press Freedom Day, the Media Council of Kenya reported that over 20 journalists had been attacked or harassed this year while in the line of duty, mostly by members of the Kenya police service. This comes after a spate of verbal attacks and social media posts from senior politicians targeting the media.

The biggest concern out of these incidences, was that members of the public did not come in defense of the media. An act that can be attributed to low media literacy levels, where due to lack of critical understanding of media and how information is sourced and published, the public is misguided through public utterances from opinion leaders about media operations, and therefore is not concerned about the welfare of journalists and media as a whole.

Additionally, the apathy portrayed by the public due to lack of critical competencies to engage with effectively and responsibly with media and information systems, has contributed partly to loss of revenue of media.

Media consumers do not feel the need to pay for information like purchasing a newspaper or even watching, listening or reading media content, which reduces media consumption patterns and thereby leading to reduced advertising placement and consequently reduced advertising revenues.

Information avenues being diverse due to digital opportunities have also eroded consumption of content in legacy media.

What role should media play?

Media should support and provide resources for consistently producing programmes/content on media and information literacy, for mass audience. This will be at the cornerstone of promoting a healthy information ecosystem, where it is able to use its platform to empower citizens to understand the media ecosystem, critically assess information and content and make informed decisions as users and producers of media content.

Media should deliberately and strategically develop mechanisms and create or adopt tools to counter disinformation, misinformation, malinformation and hate speech.

Debunking of false information, not only restores trust to independent media, but also contributes to enabling citizens understand how to differentiate false information when they encounter it in digital platforms, because of how the content was created or manipulated, and thereby improving their media and information literacy capacity.

Digital and media literacy efforts aim to equip populations with the knowledge and skills they need to obtain, process and understand information, including making good decisions about what to trust and what to share.

Quality content is king

Quality content is king, and media audience are queen. Competition from digital social platforms has pushed legacy media back to the drawing board, to transform and innovate ways to remain relevant in the digital information age.

The advancement in artificial intelligence is now contributing to new ways of content development.

While media must consistently innovate and adopt tools and technologies to help improve its functions, the quality of the content being produced must remain above board.

The health of an information ecosystem includes the quality and integrity of the information itself, in addition to the network it flows through. Healthy information should be diverse, accurate, timely, verifiable, meaningful, and include both preservation of existing knowledge and generation of relevant new material. This will also create trust in the media.

Media should also change its perception of citizens as mere consumers of the information they produce, but rather as active users and producers of information.

In meeting the demand side of the information system, citizens should access opportunities to communicate about their information needs.

This space should be made available by media in order to allow audience engagement and feedback to participatory create content.

Abraham Mariita is a Media and Communications Specialist.