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The Independent covers Africa and African affairs more than any other national newspaper, according to a media analysis undertaken by finance, education and technology PR agency TopLine Communications. The research was carried out over a two week period in April 2009, considered to be a ‘news-heavy’ time around the South African elections.
TopLine (toplinecomms.com) serves a number of clients with an interest in Africa. The research was conducted after daily monitoring of the national newspapers revealed uneven coverage of African affairs. Eight of the leading national daily publications were included in the analysis.
Throughout the period, The Independent published a total of 17 articles totalling 12,092 words about Africa, with The Guardian and the Financial Times publishing 9,486 words in 15 articles and 9,226 words in 17 articles respectively (fig 1). Overall 78 articles were produced on Africa, with 45 of these covering the election and a further ten surrounding pirate attacks off the Somalia coast.
Other topical stories included GlaxoSmithKline and Pfizer forming a new company to concentrate on HIV operations. Bob Geldof’s campaigning also received coverage, as he called for the IMF to donate proceeds from the sale of gold reserves to Africa and poorer countries struggling in the economic crisis.
In positive news, Libyan reforms were on the agenda in the Financial Times as the country undertakes major developments to meet the growing investment interest from foreign companies.
Coverage of the South African election was mostly positive with articles written about Jacob Zuma, the newly elected President, and Nelson Mandela who gave his support to Zuma’s campaign.
Heather Baker, Director of PR at TopLine Communications said: “It is our plan to repeat the analysis later this year to develop a more comprehensive picture of where the continent stands in the UK media. We would like to think that we are moving away from a stereotype in which poverty, disease, corruption and instability dominate UK national press coverage of Africa, a continent inhabited by a billion people, and it is encouraging that many of the articles analysed took a positive stance.
“We hope to see the continent take a more prominent place in the nationals, particularly with the recent surge in international investment in reconstruction projects, and the 2010 football World Cup taking place in South Africa.”
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