Swazi
Media Commentary, the social media site about human rights in
Swaziland, has received its one-millionth hit.
It
is one of the longest running social media sites concentrating on the struggle
for democracy in Swaziland.
The
one million visits are to the Swazi Media Commentary main blogsites. An
additional uncountable number of people have also accessed the site’s material
on two Facebook pages and a Twitter feed. A separate site also exists with information
and commentary about the Swazi elections that took place in 2008.
The
news aggregator All Africa dot com also distributes most of
the site’s output to websites across the word.
Items
from Swazi Media Commentary are also contained in the weekly newsletter on human rights in Swaziland that is sent
by email free-of-charge to subscribers by Africa Contact.
Annual, quarterly and monthly compilations of items from
the Swazi Media Commentary site are also gathered together and are available
free-of-charge on a Scribd account.
The
website is compiled entirely by volunteers and receives no financial backing.
One
of its strengths, according to Richard Rooney, who set up the site when he was
Head of the Journalism and Mass Communication Department at the University of
Swaziland in 2007, is that it has no base and exists entirely in Cyberspace.
This means that the authorities in Swaziland, where mainstream media are
heavily censored and two journalists are in jail for writing articles
critical of the kingdom’s judiciary, are powerless to stop it.
The
site can be updated from anywhere in the world.
In April 2011 prodemocracy campaigners failed
in an ‘uprising’ to unseat King Mswati III, who rules the kingdom as
sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch. Rooney said, ‘I spent the day of
the uprising in a settlement called Karaoglanoglu, which is hardly a dot on the
map of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, at the other end of the world
from Swaziland.
‘Equipped
with only a laptop and an Internet dongle I was able to receive information
from people on the ground, process it and have it on the website within
minutes. That day Swazi Media Commentary was being read by journalists and
activists across the world, all anxious to find the latest news on the
uprising.’
Swazi
Media Commentary started as a website containing articles about local media for
journalism students in Swaziland - hence its name. But, Rooney said, after he wrote
about a strike by textile workers in Swaziland it became clear that people with
no connection to the university were reading the site.
Gradually, the website expanded its interest to include all human rights in Swaziland.
Gradually, the website expanded its interest to include all human rights in Swaziland.
Today,
there are more than 3,600 items on the website dating back to 2007. SMC is used
as a resource by journalists, researchers, students and activists from across
the world, as well as within Swaziland itself. A large proportion of readers
are in the United States and Europe, but there are also regular visitors from
across Asia and the Middle East.
‘It
puzzles me sometimes who these people are and I wonder why somebody in, say,
Slovenia would be interested in reading about the maltreatment of Swazi
children or King Mswati’s latest spending spree,’ Rooney said.
‘But,
they are and the fact that there are people all over the world who want to see
democracy come to Swaziland, should encourage campaigners to keep up the fight.’
See also
TELLING THE TRUTH ABOUT SWAZILAND
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO US
SOCIAL MEDIA SITES PROMOTE FREEDOM
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