Women and Media

Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) recognizes media’s role in facilitating the freedom of expression and opinion.

It states: “Everyone has the right to the freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media, regardless of frontiers.”

The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, (CEDAW) addressed all forms of discrimination that occur within public and private spheres of women’s lives.

Specifically, it prohibits any form of sex role stereotyping and prejudice, exploitation and prostitution of women, and discrimination in public and political life, education and employment.

Also, the 1995 Beijing Platform for Action, (BPFA) section on Women and Media provides the roadmap for women’s advancement through women’s access and participation to expression and decision-making in and through the media and new technologies of communication.

The 1992 Constitution of Ghana guarantees freedom of speech and expression, including the right to freedom of the press and other media, the right to information and the establishment of the independent National Media Commission (NMC).

Analysts believe however that quantity has not necessarily been matched with quality.The BPFA gave an overview of problems and issues surrounding women and the media and spelt out specific strategies for governments, media and non-governmental organizations and other civil society actors.

It called for: a) women’s increased participation in and access to media and new information and communication technologies (ICTs); b) promotion of a balanced and non-stereotyped representation of women in the media.

Four years later, Women Watch, an initiative of the United Nations to assess progress and obstacles on BPFA held an online-discussion, which concluded that there have been few improvements in media portrayal of women both in advertising and news coverage.

It noted that women and media monitoring groups have made some contributions in promoting positive images and role of women in media.

The internet for instance allows women groups to set up their own web pages and networks more effectively.

It is also a source of women’s denigration and exploitation, as demonstrated by the exploitation of Ghanaian women on pornographic web sites currently.

Programmes such as ‘Maa Nkomo’, a gender talk show on GTV educates women on health and other social issues.

Apart this, there are few gender sensitive programmes on radio. The media landscape in Ghana is, particularly the print media highly competitive.

This has been heightened by the newspaper reviews on the electronic media every morning, where the catchy political headlines become the topic for discussion. Little attention is devoted gender sensitive stories.

Worldwide statistics by the International Women’s Media Foundation, 2001 (IWMF) on women working within the media states that the overall number of female journalists employed in the media around the world has decreased by 2 percent in the last five years.

Today women constitute 41 percent of working journalists. In the 1995 report by Margaret Gallagher for UNESCO, women were not a significant part of the media workforce.

In Africa, women are 8 percent of broadcasting managers and 14 percent of managers in the print media.

A majority (nearly 60 percent) of the female journalists from around the world who responded to a 1997 IWMF survey said that not even one out of 10 decision-makers in their companies were women. The figure was even higher, 79 percent for respondents from Asia.

In spite of women’s immense contributions to the development of democracy, the media in Ghana continue to marginalize women’s concerns and issues. Research has shown that a liberalized media environment with its commercial pressures often produces news and programmes that do not empower women or promote gender equity. Women are often portrayed in the media by their sex and sexuality.

The media has become a leading source of information about sex and sexuality to teenagers, especially females. But these images do not give people realistic and healthy views of sex and sexuality.

Only few of references to sex on TV include any reference to abstinence from sex, birth control, risk of pregnancy, or sexually transmitted diseases. Obviously girls bear the risk of pregnancy and are also more likely to contract STDs than boys, states the American Academy of Pediatrics, (AAP) “Sexuality, Contraception and the Media, 2001.

Some studies show that repeated sexual content in the media may influence teens to have sex earlier. In Ghana , there is an upsurge of foreign (Mexican telenovelas/soap operas) by the media, by TV stations which are beginning to influence female dressing greatly. T

hey put on all kinds of dresses that expose their vital parts hitherto covered by traditional / cultural (local) outfits. When men are shown in videos, they are most often fully clothed.

But when women are shown, half the time they are dressed in ways that expose or focus on their breasts and rear ends.

Little wonder that the Ghanaian female has become the icon of musical videos. Certain images in the media depict that female sexuality is related to exchanging sex for money. In advertising, women’s bodies are used to sell products more often than men.

Through the media tattooing, eye lash and nail extension, make-up application, pedicure and manicure etc. have whipped the appetite of most Ghanaian females, who consider them ‘western’ / modern.

Women seen most often in the media are fashion models, singers and actresses, and recently politicians. Females also get the chance in the media when they fall victim to abuses such as rape, incest and assault.

The potential exists for the media to make a far greater contribution to the advancement of women. Even though women are involved in careers in the communications sector, few have attained positions at the decision-making level.

This has contributed to the failure to eliminate the gender-based stereotyping found in the media. In Ghana, women make up less than 20% of the formal workforce and less than 10% of top management in the media.

Thus, the media like other institutions are male dominated. A recent media study on categories of issues covered by the media in Ghana from January 2006 to December the same year saw gender at 10th position with the number of stories at 1281, representing approximately 2.01%.As usual politics topped the list of stories covered by the private Ghanaian media with the figure at 12404 and 19.42%. The Centre for Media Analysis and Research, (CMAR) conducted the study.

The Women’s Manifesto for Ghana is a political document that identifies key national issues of concern to women and calls on policy makers and relevant agencies to address them.

It relates the media’s performance to the ways in which governments inform citizens to enable them participate in decision-making and how governments respond to issues of concern raised by and about the media.

“For democracy to function not only do women need adequate information to make choices at the ballot box but they also need to make decisions about their lives and to monitor and evaluate government policies and actions.”

It adds, “Yet information gaps persist between women’s civil society organisations and government agencies including the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs, and between government organisation and the media.”

The Women’s Manifesto demands among others that government formulate and adopt comprehensive communication and information policy that would address issues of denigrating media representation and content and clarify issues relating to access, control and information flow.

“The government, through parliament must pass into law a gender-responsive Freedom of Information Bill to enhance access to information and ultimately benefit women and the marginalized in society.”

It stress that government strengthen the institutions set up to regulate media content by providing adequate human and financial resources to enable them perform their functions in a manner which does not jeopardize press freedom ,while promoting the goals of gender sensitivity and fairness.

In spite of the perceived negative development in the media Ghana, the industry is one of the most vibrant. There are a lot of non-political issues all around us. T

he media must look out for the impact policies make on the marginalized or the less privileged in society, particularly women.