A television study on the influence of media ownership on news content in Uganda: A comparison of Wavah Broadcasting Services (WBS) and Nation Television (NTV) Samuel Kazibwe (215080835) Supervisor: Prof. Ruth Elizabeth Teer-Tomaselli A thesis submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Centre for Communication, Media and Society University of KwaZulu-Natal 2018 DECLARATION College of Humanities Declaration – Plagiarism I, Samuel Kazibwe, hereby declare that this thesis is my original work except where otherwise indicated. The thesis has not been submitted for any degree or examination at any other university. It does not contain data, graphs, pictures or other information from any other person or the internet except where it is specifically acknowledged and the sources are detailed both in the text and the reference list. This study was undertaken between March 2015 and November 2017 under the supervision of Prof Ruth Elizabeth Teer-Tomaselli. Signature: ……………………………………… Date: ……………………………… Supervisor: ……………………………………. Date: ……………………………… i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to thank the Almighty God for successfully walking me through this intellectual journey. To paraphrase Barack Obama‘s words during his inaugural address as the 44th president of the United States in January 2009, the journey has been long and the climb has been steep. However, due to God‘s mercy and kindness, I have been able to make it. I wish to express my gratitude to the Norwegian Programme for Capacity Development in Higher Education and Research for Development (NORHED) as well as Uganda Christian University (UCU) for jointly providing the necessary funds for this study. I am very sure that if I had not received this funding it would have taken me much longer to enrol for a PhD especially in a highly regarded institution like the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN). My special appreciation also goes to my supervisor Prof Ruth Elizabeth Teer-Tomaselli for her counsel, patience and encouragement throughout this exercise. I will never forget the day I was leaving your office and you remarked that; ―Sam, I am proud to have you as my student‖. Prof, you may not have realised but during that time I had started feeling a little overwhelmed by the study. However, receiving such an unprompted compliment from a reputable academic raised my enthusiasm to pursue the study to its logical conclusion. For this, I will remain eternally grateful to you Prof. Special thanks go to Prof Monica Chibita the head of the Mass Communication department at UCU for coordinating the NORHED project in Uganda. You did a great job and may God reward you abundantly. I am glad that our academic pathways have crossed. To Dorothy Nalugya, the administrative assistant at the Mass Communication department, I owe you a big debt for moving up and down on my behalf at UCU. I also extend my gratitude to fellow NORHED beneficiaries including Dr Brian Semujju, Dr Sara Namusoga, Dr Angela Napakol and Dr Emilly Comfort Maractho. These four arrived at the University of Kwa-Zulu Natal (UKZN) a year before I joined. They would later play various roles in my academic journey. On my first day at UKZN, it was Angela who guided me through ii the entire registration process. Later, Brian and Sara took turns to read through several chapters of my work and their comments greatly enriched this thesis. To my great friends Fred Kakooza and J-P Almaze, I cannot thank you enough for making my stay in South Africa comfortable. These are the two people I spent most of my time with while in Durban. On the one hand, Fred happened to be a classmate in the PhD class. However, although he came from Uganda, we first met at UKZN where we formed an inextricable friendship. On the other hand, J-P was a Masters‘ student from Seychelles who resided in my first place of residence – Glenmore Pastoral Centre (GPC). The three of us became best friends. We always guided and encouraged each other whenever the going got tough. To put it differently, we went through the ‗thick and thin‘ together. I am convinced that this study and my entire stay in South Africa would have been much more difficult without these two friends. I am also highly indebted to my respondents at WBS and NTV for accepting to be interviewed for this study. I also thank Joseph Lukyamuzi and Samuel Maling for their help during the process of coding and analysing quantitative data. This study would not have been successful without all of you. I wish to thank my mum and dad for the prayers and emotional support. You are my inspiration. Lastly, special thanks go to my dear other Sania for your patience while I was away for studies. It must have been tough for you but thanks for understanding that this was a worthy journey for us. iii ABSTRACT The media play an important role of entertaining, educating and informing society (Herman and Chomsky, 1988:1). The education and information offered by the media consequently helps citizens to make informed decisions. However, a number of factors including media ownership have over time stifled the functions of the media limiting its ability to advance issues of public interest (Mcchesney, 2008:37; Nyarko, 2015: ii). This study therefore sought to investigate how media ownership has influenced news content in Ugandan television stations. The study compared two television stations (WBS and NTV) representing different ownership structures. WBS is an independently owned station while NTV is owned by a regional media conglomerate called Nation Media Group (NMG). A study on television was necessary given that the existing literature on media ownership in Uganda does not adequately address television. Most studies on this subject have focused on newspapers and radio stations. Yet, television is increasingly becoming a major source of information for many Ugandans. Quantitative content analysis and in-depth interviews were the main methods used in this investigation. Content analysis was used to examine news bulletins on the two stations to establish how the differences in ownership structures affected news content. In total, twenty news bulletins were examined. The in-depth interviews were employed to collect respondents‘ views on the influence of media ownership on editorial independence as well as the effect of external factors on news. The data from the interviews was also used to complement the results from quantitative content analysis. The study found out that media ownership influenced news content on the two television stations during the period under study. It however contradicted the view in the political economy of the media that media concentration diminishes the performance of television stations. The findings demonstrated that NTV (which is owned by a media concentration) had more diverse news bulletins than WBS which is independently owned. It was further discovered that NTV journalists exercised more editorial independence than their counterparts at WBS. However, it was observed that news content in all television stations in Uganda, regardless of the structure of ownership, was affected by political interference and advertisement. Both politicians and advertisers influenced news content directly and indirectly. iv LIST OF ACRONYMS ACME – African Centre for Media and Excellence BC – Broadcasting Council CP – Conservative Party DP – Democratic Party FDC – Forum for Democratic Change FCC – Federal Communications Commission HRN-U – Human Rights Network – Uganda HRNJ-U – Human Rights Network for Journalists – Uganda IGG – Inspector General of Government IMCU – Independent Media of Council of Uganda MC – Media Council NAB – National Association of Broadcasters NIJU – National Institute of Journalists in Uganda NMG – Nation Media Group NRM – National Resistance Movement OB Unit – Outside Broadcasting Unit PPU – Presidential Protection Unit RDC – Resident District Commissioner SPSS – Statistical Package for Social Sciences STBs – Set Top Boxes UCC – Uganda Communications Commission UMOA – Uganda Media Owners Association UPC – Uganda People‘s Congress URN – Uganda Radio Network v TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION ........................................................................................................................ i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS........................................................................................................ ii ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................. iv LIST OF ACRONYMS ...............................................................................................................v CHAPTER ONE .........................................................................................................................1 INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................................1 Research objectives and research questions .................................................................................1 Study context ..............................................................................................................................2 Governance .................................................................................................................................4 Economy .....................................................................................................................................6 The study rationale ......................................................................................................................6