How Foreign Aid Fuels African Media’s Payola Problem
In many African countries, a dirty secret of journalism is that reporters earn most of their income from payments by their sources. And the dirtiest secret of all is that the international aid community is among the most prolific payers.
NEW YORK – At a recent press conference, a small group of Liberian journalists made a courageous admission: they confessed they were all “on the take.” To supplement salaries as low as $40 a month, the journalists said they often rely on payments from the very people they write about.