Africa-Press – Seychelles. Representatives from media houses across the East and Southern Africa are gathered at the Premier Hotels & Resorts in Johannesburg, South Africa at the invitation of Aids & Rights Alliance for South Africa (Arasa) to develop a toolkit on bodily autonomy and integrity (BAI) to assist media personnel in reporting on issues related to the subject matter.
In 2021, Arasa hosted an online media training on Bodily Autonomy and Integrity (BAI), which was attended by media representatives from media houses across East and Southern Africa.
Following that media training, Arasa commissioned the development of the toolkit and this meeting is a pilot training for this toolkit.
The purpose of the pilot training is to seek feedback on the draft training resource from media practitioners themselves before finalisation of the toolkit.
Nyasha Chingore from Arasa hopes that this training and the toolkit will result in more accurate and unbiased media coverage which gives space to silenced communities and the impact of violations of their bodily autonomy and integrity.
So far the participants had interactive sessions where they learnt about the basic concepts of BAI, debunking myths and misconceptions on BAI and highlighted the importance for the media to be the allies for bodily autonomy, the role of media in promoting BAI.
Expected outcomes
The expected outcomes of the workshop for journalists are: Increased ability by participants to write accurate, un-stigmatising and unbiased articles on BAI and to cover issues related to Sexual Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR), structural barriers and criminalisation of HIV and key and vulnerable populations at national and regional levels; Increased ability to cover BAI, SRHR, SOGI and UHC project work and advocacy initiatives with a heightened awareness of the intersectionality of human rights and provide coverage that is sensitive and ethical; Increased capacity of media representatives in the region to identify and investigate human rights violations against key and vulnerable populations in southern and east Africa; Increased capacity of media practitioners to identify laws and policies which inhibit the rights of key and vulnerable populations in southern and east Africa; and A strengthened relationship between media partners and practitioners with national and regional civil society organisations (CSOs).
Beyond the toolkit, Arasa announced three grants for ZAR 140,000 to support investigative pieces on BAI and the application process is currently open.
Participants are from Mauritius, Botsawana, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Uganda, Kenya, Mozambique and Seychelles. The latter is being represented by Sylvie Ah-Time and Vidya Gappy.
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