Last week, the contrast between legacy media and social media, or the Fourth Estate and the Fifth Estate, once again came to the fore and in a very unlikely place; the Uganda High Court.
Apparently during the ongoing trial of Ms Molly Katanga who is accused of the murder of her husband Henry Katanga in November 2023, the prosecution asked the trial judge, Justice Rosette Comfort Kania, to bar a citizen journalist from continuing to report on the trial because, among other reasons, the latter’s online reporting and commentary was too opinionated and could prejudice the case.
The defence team opposed the ‘gag’ application, arguing that ‘such a move could have a chilling effect on open justice and media freedom’.
Taking into consideration both side’s concerns, the judge ruled that the citizen journalist may continue reporting, but must adhere to specific court reporting guidelines that include sticking to what transpired in court and not discussing the merits and demerits of it. This was a fair decision.
Courts are very formal places that operate within rules and decorum because they are (at least supposed to be) the ‘temple of justice’ where justice must not just be done but must be seen to be done.
Media reporting on court trials should, therefore, also adhere to rules and decorum. This has mostly been the case with legacy media, except tabloids that thrived on sensationalism.
How a trial is reported can undermine or promote justice.
Indeed every media house has court reporting guidelines embedded in its editorial policies. The journalism code of ethics similarly covers this. It is universal. The cardinal rules, as with all other reporting, is to be factual, balanced, impartial, and give both sides of the story.
Specifically with court reporting, stories must avoid discussion or commentary on the issues in the court. Stories should only tell what transpired i.e what was said, who said, in reference to what, etc and not debate what a witness or accused said and going ahead to give an opinion whether they’re being truthful or not.
It is therefore easy to understand why the prosecution was impelled to make the above request in the Katanga case.
The citizen journalist had been making very partial and sometimes unnerving commentary of this trial on social media.
Another journalist is also accused of doing the same; pushing the narrative of the prosecution, but perhaps with less zeal. Both are wrong and amount to what is often referred to as ‘trial by the media’.
Media freedom and freedom of expression are not absolute. They are enjoyed with nuance and context, and come with great responsibility.
Yes, the arrival of social media, or the Fifth Estate has flipped journalism as we knew it before. It has not only democratised information gathering and dissemination, but it is also unbound by many of the rules of old. This has brought about both good and bad.
The good is that old media cannot unfairly use its gatekeeping channels to bottle information the goes to the public. The bad is that new media is like an open sewer where everything goes to the public in whatever form. The result is fake news, sensational news, insensitive news, propaganda, unbalanced news, etc.
Unethical reporting of court proceedings might throw to the public all the information pertaining to a trial, but it will likely undermine one of the key tenets of the justice system, namely that justice must not just be done but must be seen to be done. Case commentators that shout out loudest will drown out those that are less loud and thus skew the public perceptions of a case.
They may in the end undermine its outcome – one way or the other. Court trials are not zero-sum game; they are about justice, fairness, etc.
Yes, we cannot at this point run away from the reality of the Fourth and Fifth estates and their peculiar characteristics.
But we can learn from the good of either, particularly in specialised areas such as court reporting.
In fact even in newsrooms, not every reporter is assigned court reporting duties because of recognition of the fact that it calls for more than the 5Ws and H.