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South African president urges African media to tell good "African stories"

Xinhua, May 23, 2015 Adjust font size:

African stories should be told by Africans to Africans, South African President Jacob Zuma said on Friday.

"As Africans we still face the disadvantage of having our stories being told by people whose perspective is foreign to the continent," Zuma said.

"This must change. Africa has several good stories to tell, and these must be told," the president said at the launch of Africa News Channel by the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) in Midrand, Johannesburg.

The SABC must be ready to tell these stories of hard work "as we build a better Africa and a better world," said Zuma.

"Our public broadcaster should also capture the rich history of Africa through dialogue and debates. We want to hear progressive African intellectuals deliberating and analyzing the situation in Africa in a constructive manner that builds a better Africa."

The Africa News Channel 404 will reach 51 countries and not just the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region.

"It is thus important that we are going to start sharing our success stories with the continent more extensively. We are also happy that South Africans will also be now more exposed to what is happening in the continent," Zuma said.

Africa also has good programmes of promoting socioeconomic development through various organs of the African Union (AU), and these are being implemented, said Zuma.

Today's launch of the 24-hour news channel to the continent dovetails with the movement towards digital migration, Zuma said.

The process is well advanced and the migration process will begin to take shape in the next few months, he said.

In March this year, the South African cabinet approved the final amendments to the Broadcasting Digital Migration Policy which paved the way for the implementation of digital migration.

The migration is expected to release valuable spectrum which will allow for more television channels, and will also result in job creation in the communication and creative industry sectors and better quality broadcasting.

The launch of the channel took place during Africa Month and therefore one of the key milestones in the celebrations, Zuma said. Endi