VICTORIA, Seychelles — Around ten journalists are this week following a training course on the professional coverage of the work of the National Assembly of Seychelles. The training, which is being held in Mahé from 5 to 9 February 2024 at the L’Escale Resort Marina & Spa, is organised by the Indian Ocean Commission (COI) within the framework of its Governance, Peace and Stability (GPS) project, financed by the French Development Agency. The course is being read as part of a broader effort to strengthen the capacity of the local media to cover the work of the country’s democratic institutions, and is the latest in a series of COI-supported training programmes in the country.
Mr Jean-Luc Mootoosamy, journalist and media expert from the CFI, the media arm of the French Development Agency, is leading the training together with journalists from a variety of newsrooms. Why this training? To improve the understanding of the functioning of democratic institutions and the journalistic coverage of their activities, explained Mr Mootoosamy, who is also the director of the Swiss-based firm Media Expertise. Very often, journalists are called upon to cover parliamentary sessions without really understanding the technical terms. The framing of the training reflects a long-standing concern in the local media about the depth of technical knowledge that parliamentary reporting requires.
Within the framework of the GPS project, the COI aims to create opportunities for collaboration between the media and democratic institutions in order to improve the quality of information for the public. The training is, in effect, the latest in a series of joint initiatives between the COI and the Seychelles National Assembly, and builds on a similar programme that was run with parliamentary staff last year. The COI’s involvement in this area reflects the commission’s view that the quality of public information is a key element of democratic governance in the Indian Ocean region.
The opening of the training was attended by the Chief Electoral Officer of the Electoral Commission of Seychelles, Madame Manuella Amesbury, and the Deputy Clerk of the National Assembly, Mademoiselle Alexandria Faure, as well as other senior parliamentary and electoral officials. The presence of the senior parliamentary and electoral officials at the opening of the training is being read as a sign of the importance that the country’s institutions attach to the quality of media coverage of their work. It is also a sign of the willingness of the institutions to engage directly with the journalists on the technical aspects of the work, and to support a long-term improvement in the depth of parliamentary reporting in the local media.
The training programme covers a range of topics related to the coverage of parliamentary work, including an overview of the legislative process, the role of the opposition, the work of the committees, the budget cycle, and the techniques for covering debates in the chamber. The training also includes practical exercises in the form of simulated committee hearings, in which the journalists have to cover a mock session and produce a news story under time pressure. The breadth of the curriculum reflects the depth of the work that goes into the production of quality parliamentary reporting, and is being read as a model for similar training programmes in the wider Indian Ocean region.
