From an Aug. 15 commentary on globeandmail.com by Ross Howard, a journalism educator who has trained foreign journalists:
What depresses me beyond Mahad Ahmed Elmi's death is how little Canada does about basic journalism abroad, and resultant reporter tragedies.
Canadian official and non-government support for media development abroad, as a portion of foreign aid, is minuscule, compared to all other major Western democracies. (Ottawa has funded HornAfrik Radio.) The lack of interest by public and private funders is particularly embarrassing considering Canada's reputation for a financially healthy, legally sheltered, efficiently regulated and exceptionally skilled media industry, including journalism. Yet, we have almost nothing to offer the world's journalists.
And what surprises me is how modest is most of the debate among Canadian journalists, and journalism schools, and professional bodies (the Canadian Association of Journalists is a welcome exception) about threats to fundamental journalism in Canada from corporate concentration, deregulation and government secrecy. Perhaps it is because unlike Somalis, Canadians don't require courage to be journalists.
Howard also made this very salient observation:
More than 128 journalists and media workers have died so far this year around the globe. A thousand have died since 1997. As the International News Safety Institute and others now note, beyond Iraq the trend in deadly journalism is not toward media workers on the front lines covering military campaigns, firefights and shootouts. The rising toll is among those courageous enough to simply report on local community conflict and violent politics even-handedly, and among those who dare to dig deeper, to investigate and reveal corruption.
On Aug. 13, the Globe's Africa correspondent Stephanie Nolen offered some perspective on the killings of Somali journalists Mahad Elmi and Ali Iman Sharmarke. Elmi was a host at HornAfrik, a company founded by Sharmarke.
I first heard about HornAfrik in 2002, when Canadian Journalists for Free Expression honoured its three founders with the Courage in Journalism Award. They couldn't make the ceremony, but organizers played a short film that told the story of three Somali refugees who came to Canada with nothing, built prosperous new lives for themselves, and then gave it all up to move back to the anarchy of Mogadishu and start an independent media company in an effort to support the country's fragile steps toward peace and democracy. ...
... Everywhere I went in Mogadishu (and, on subsequent trips, elsewhere in Somalia), people were listening to their broadcasts and were profoundly grateful for the straight-up, tell-it-like-it-is reporting that they provided and the forum they gave Somalis across society to air their views. They brought a powerful sense of independence to their work - the only time I have ever heard anyone talk like that in Somalia, where clan and family loyalties have trumped years and years of efforts for peace.
Abdisalam Adan co-founded HornAfrik with Elmi and Sharmarke:
"Ali died in vain if I stop what we are doing," he said last night. "The risk is real and I have to think about it. But on other hand, we have people who are bent on silencing anyone who does anything positive in this country. So giving up would mean giving in to them. All of our business and community leaders have left in the last few months, as the clashes have been going on, and the [militias are] targeting different people. But I have to make sure that those who died for these ideals did not die for nothing."