Has your view of Africa changed?
Hi, it's Ros here,
Welcome to the Daily Truth (renamed from the Daily Email in honour of an impressively confident advertising campaign for a Ugandan newspaper which promised readers they’d could ‘read the truth’ by opening its pages.)
So here I am sitting next to a life-size wooden elephant and an Italian coffee shop with Lionel Richie playing in the background. I’m not quite sure how it came to this! We’re at the very pretty Safari Park Hotel just outside Nairobi but the only big beasts to be seen are some of us guests. (The reason we’re here is that it’s the Ö÷²¥´óÐã African Radio Awards tomorrow, and we’ll have a fantastic range of people attending on the show.)
HAVE AFRICANS CHANGED YOUR VIEW OF AFRICA OVER THE LAST TWO WEEKS?
Email us: worldhaveyoursay@bbc.co.uk – and please put your phone number if you’d like to come on air.
During our six shows from Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda and Kenya, we’ve discussed an enormous number of subjects and heard as disparate a range of opinions as on any WHYS trip.
Has one discussion or comment got you thinking? Did it change your view of Africa? I think the answer for all of us from WHYS is a definite yes but what about you? We’d love to hear your thoughts, and there will an audience of Africans waiting to respond.
Post here: www.bbcnews.com/worldhaveyoursay
(We’re onto a bizarre a capella version of ‘Leaving on a Jet Plane’ now.)
HOW FREE IS THE PRESS IN AFRICA?
Post here: www.bcnews.com/worldhaveyoursay
There’s a major debate here in Kenya over proposed legislation which will give the government powers to close media organisations in certain circumstances. Of course it’s necessary to regulate the press in some way say those proposing it (with public security their number one reason), others insist the news laws will be an unjustified restriction on press freedom.
Remember back two years to the government raids on the Standard newspaper group and you’ll know this is an open wound for many Kenyans. We’ll look across Africa as well. I was struck how many Nigerians told me that their press isn’t free, but opening the papers it seemed to be a free-for-all on the government. So I’d like to better understand what they were getting at.
(Ah, it’s Hall&Oates.)
ABDI ENTERS THE WHYS HALL OF FAME
After the amazing efforts of some of you in Nigeria who travelled over 1000kms to see us, Abdi has booked himself into this exclusive club. He journey took two days and was also over 1000kms. It was very good to see you yesterday Abdi. He made the excellent suggestion of doing a far shorter version of the Daily Email which can be SMSed to people with no Internet connection. We’ll look into it…
NO THANK YOUS FOR THE MUSIC
And so I finish this with Don McLean in the background. Why do African hotels assume that those of us from outside of the continent don’t want to hear anything recorded by Africans, unless it’s a South African choir? Nairobi has one of the best music scenes in Africa, but you wouldn’t know it from going to anywhere where Westerners are expected. Or maybe I’ve just been unlucky. Right, got that one of my chest…
We’ve really appreciated how involved you’ve been in these African programmes. Please keep it up today and help us finish with a discussion that rewards all the effort that you and my WHYS colleagues have put into the trip.
Speak to you later.
Cheers,
Ros
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