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By Pierre Njie
Junkung Jobarteh, the Executive Secretary of the Media Council of The Gambia (MCG) has said that MCG’s mission is to protect media practitioners through complaints received from people about breach on code of conduct with its related laws.
Mr Jobarteh made this remark on Thursday during a press conference held at The Gambia Press Union (GPU) Secretariat in Fajara.
The Media Council of The Gambia was established by the Gambia Press Union in December 2018 as part of the reform processes facilitated by the government through the Ministry of Information, Communication and Technology. The council serves as a regulatory body for the media fraternity.
According to Mr Jobarteh, the council will monitor, record and publish names of compliance about ethical standards as well as promote and ensure the code of conduct is adhered to.
“The GPU’s code of conduct will provide guidelines on ethical standards on all the categories. The council and the Ethics Panel will sit over the complaints so as to resolve them amicably,” he explained. He expressed optimism that there will be transparency to ensure that the complainants build trust in the day-to-day activities of the council. He also observed that the benefits on self regulation are overwhelming for both the media and the general public.
Mr. Jobarteh stated that this will also help to prevent the government or state apparatus from interfering with the media, provide regulation before reaching out to any court level, adding that it will provide free cost complaint resolution process.
He said the advantage of this self-regulatory process is that none of the parties will bear any form of financial and material cost in filling and hearing their complaints. He noted that journalists have a responsibility to adhere to the rules of the council so as to avoid seeing them settling matters before the courts.