Not a seat was free on Tuesday 10 February at the Frontline Club, as a panel of experts convened for a discussion entitled Embedding with Aid Agencies: Editorial Integrity and Security Risks. The ideas of intention and interpretation dominated the evening, with the panel’s arguments and audience comments exposing a relationship of disconnect and simultaneous dependency between aid agencies and journalists. What happens when the two work together? The pros, cons, irritations and limitations experienced by both sides made for a lively debate.

L-r: Lisa Reilly and Siobhan Sinnerton

The event was organised in partnership with the European Interagency Security Forum and chaired by the co-founder and CEO of IRIN, Ben Parker. Speakers included: Polly Markandya, head of communications at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF); Lisa Reilly, executive coordinator of the European Interagency Security Forum (EISF); Michelle Betz, who works on media development with the UN and other aid agencies; and Siobhan Sinnerton, commissioning editor for news and current affairs at Channel 4.

The discussion began by covering the common ground between NGO workers and journalists. Betz, a former journalist herself, outlined the competitive economic picture. “The aid business really is big business, just as journalism is a business” she said. To a certain extent, NGOs and media outlets often share the same risks and liability issues when working in conflict and hostile environments. Betz experienced this first-hand when she was sentenced to five years hard labour by the Egyptian government for work that she did for an NGO. “It is not just journalists, such as those from Al Jazeera, that governments go after, but NGO workers as well,” she said.

Behind the simplified NGO-journalist dynamic remains a multi-faceted backdrop. Reilly reflected on her experience working at the European Interagency Security Forum (EISF). “Within NGOs we don’t have a consistent view, we often see gaps between the communications department and the rest of operations and programs in the first place,” she said. Nevertheless, when logistics are well planned, NGOs and journalists can work harmoniously with mutually beneficial results.

Sinnerton illustrated this point with a film made for Channel 4’s Unreported World on handicapped Syrian refugees in Lebanon, entitled The Invisible People. Sinnerton explained how Handicap International, the NGO involved in the film, saw a significant rise in donations after it aired. Sinnerton strongly advised that “transparency is the key for things not becoming massively unstuck in the field.” Apart from honesty, which all the panellists agreed was essential between NGOs and journalists, Markandya pointed out that it ultimately comes down to trust. “We have done a number of documentary projects recently and we have had to give up the illusion of control and trust the journalist to do a fair job,” she said.

What happens when the journalists themselves are unable to cover important stories?  This was the case with the recent high-risk Ebola epidemic in parts of West Africa. In order that the story reached the general public, Markandya explained how MSF partnered with a production company in order to design customised camera equipment that could be attached to doctors’ protective goggles and could withstand chemical de-contamination. The result was a pressing and highly emotive documentary broadcast by BBC Panorama.

L-r: Polly Markandya and Michelle Betz

However, too often the means of getting a story can taint relationships between aid organisations and journalists. Even when journalists abide by protocol, their good intentions can have a negative impact on the aid organisations involved. Reilly questioned, “should the journalists be saying ‘transport was provided by ‘X’ NGO’? It demonstrates the journalists’ ethics but what does that do to us and our security?”

While journalists go in and out of the field, NGOs often remain there in the longterm. Reilly emphasised how heavily their work relies on the acceptance of local communities, and how that fragile reality can be undone by careless reporters. Injecting the journalistic perspective, Sinnerton spoke in turn of the promises made by aid organisations that often contrasted with hostile receptions towards journalists on the ground. This steered the discussion back towards Markandya’s key argument that NGOs and journalists must work on “managing expectations”.

The dichotomy of protecting the subject versus exposing the story remains a sensitive one, and a number of audience members agreed that these two sides were often in opposition. Audience comments revolved around questions of favouritism between NGOs and certain news outlets, the difficulty of exercising complete transparency in practice, and the need for NGOs to relinquish control over media content. While aid workers and journalists may settle for what Betz called “a mutual mistrust,” the panel agreed that the understanding between the two has advanced. For all the new NGOs that are emerging globally and their young journalistic counterparts, this symbiotic relationship will no doubt continue.

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On Monday 10 November, the Frontline Club hosted a preview screening of Liberia – Living With Ebola, the first episode in Al Jazeera’s latest series of Africa Investigates. The film documented the impact of Ebola on those at the front line of the disease in Liberia, focusing on the communities worst hit and the healthcare workers who run the Ebola Treatment Units (ETUs) and take away the highly infectious bodies of the dead.

The film was presented by Sierra Leonean reporter Sorious Samura, whose intimate understanding of the culture and people provided a glimpse into the fight against Ebola not explored by Western journalists.

The screening was followed by a Q&A with Samura, the film’s director Clive Patterson and the evening’s host, Channel 4’s Tom Clarke, who had himself recently returned from covering the Ebola story in Sierra Leone.

“The strength of [the film], is it’s about Liberia living with Ebola. . . . The thing we forget is that the solution to it is how countries are living with it, managing it,” said Clarke in his opening statement.

One of the main issues that the film tackled was how the combination of corruption and government mistrust helped to fuel the outbreak.

“Millions of pounds have poured into that country to help build the health structure, the schools. Where has that money gone?” Samura asked. There were some tough questions about who was to blame for the aid black whole that left Liberia and Sierra Leone so unprepared for the outbreak.

“There is a level of negligence there on the part of Western donors who basically allowed Liberia to get away with the requirements when it came to healthcare,” said Patterson.

Naturally this raised questions about the postcolonial relationship between Africa and the West. What is the best way to tackle Ebola without falling into the discourses of old?

Ultimately the responsibility to tackle corruption lies with the people of Liberia and Sierra Leone, Samura told the audience. And he has started to see that change in how the people of Liberia have begun to ask questions in a way they never would have before.

“I grow up in Sierra Leone and we don’t look at people in their eyes when they talk. People of authority, we don’t ask questions. But now we have like emails from Sierra Leoneans asking questions,” Samura said.

But have we not learned anything from any of the other diseases that have afflicted Africa, an audience member asked?

“These governments that we have in place, first of all they were never prepared, they don’t know what to do when it came and they, perhaps, will not even know what to do when the NGOs have packed and left,” said Samura.

It is clear that controlling the spread of Ebola in Liberia and Sierra Leone is only the first part of the story, and once the initial crisis has passed there are a lot of questions that will need to be answered about why people still don’t trust their government, and why aid money still doesn’t make it to the ground.

Emmy- and BAFTA-winning reporter from Sierra Leone, Sorious Samura joins Liberian investigative reporter, Mae Azango, to reveal the inside story of the Ebola outbreak from the worst hit country – Liberia. Bringing an African perspective to the devastating spread of the virus, they reveal not only the heroic efforts being made by teams on the front line, but also the deep anger and mistrust held by Liberians towards their government in this time of crisis.

Furious health workers rage against the authorities for cuts in their pay, while their colleagues continue to die at an alarming rate. As belated international support finally pours in, Samura discovers the hidden impact of the outbreak. This timely and challenging film offers an inside view of a country living with Ebola.

Directed by Clive Patterson
Duration: 24
Year: 2014

“Does the Pubic Still Care?” was the poignant title of the discussion on conflict and disaster reporting which was chaired by Ben Parker at the Frontline Club on Thursday 23 October. The event was organised by the Oversees Development Institute and Humanitarian Policy Group. Channel 4 News anchor, Jon Snow, and senior reporter for the People and Power programme on Al Jazeera English, Juliana Ruhfus, were joined by experts in aid and development, Marc DuBois, former head of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and Eva Svoboda, research fellow in the Humanitarian Policy Group at the Overseas Development Institute.

The event was being followed online #crisisreporting

The relationship of dependency and power that exists between aid agencies, the public and the media was the core focus of the evening. Using examples from Gaza to Haiti and East Timor, the panel illustrated the crisis and development each of these elements has undergone and how it has affected the other.

To begin the audience was taken back to the 1984 Ethiopia famine with Michael Burke’s compelling documentary report. Parker, who has worked in media and humanitarian aid for 20 years, opened the discussion with the following question:

“Can a news moment like Michael Burke’s piece happen again? . . . Can it ignite the public? Can it change the course of history in a small way? . . . Does TV in that same way still exist?”

Snow’s initial response was an affirmative yes. He used examples from the last four years of public response to make his case. For example, the 2010 Haiti earthquake saw the emergency fund raise it’s second largest ever donation. Snow said, “The stream is certainly not dry and I would argue that our connected digital world is making it easier for us to draw attention.”

DuBois similarly dismissed public disaster fatigue and focused on the power of compassion, saying “disaster is inherently compelling . . . compassion is alive and well”.

Ruhfus instead argued that the quality of giving has changed. She referred to the lack of clarity and neutrality in today’s media reports and national aid donations.

“The ‘us’ and ‘them’ that was very simple when Michael Burke made his films has totally shifted. . . . I am the enemy. I am no longer the ‘saviour’ and that’s a similar fate that aid agencies are dealing with too.”

Ruhfus implied that in the past aid agencies were able to function in an apolitical sphere. Svoboda’s standpoint was somewhere in between, to her mind although 9/11 had a negative impact on aid agencies they were always politicised. She argued that despite being more complex, today there are more actors, more competition and, importantly, more accountability. All four of the speakers agreed that more people in the world are aware of what is going on around them than ever before.

The discussion turned to the ever-present Ebola crisis and its slow journey to UK headlines. This highlighted the question of responsibility between the aid agencies and the media to expose conflicts and disasters adequately. Snow asked his fellow speakers, “How far did the aid agencies go in persuading governments that there was a crisis?”

In return he was asked by Svoboda and DuBois how many reports were not picked up by the media. Svoboda said, “Very often you will be faced with people who just don’t care, with states that don’t care about their international obligations.”

Snow clarified the media’s stance, “We are not in the field to raise money or bring relief in any form, but to tell the story.”

Despite his positive outlook Snow admitted the failure of the media coverage on Ebola and thus the insufficient pressure on the UK government. He expressed his frustrations as a journalist with failed government policies. Of the current humanitarian crisis caused by ISIS he said:

“ISIS is a direct consequence of our people, by our people I mean us Westerners. Somehow we made this mess. Of course it was there ready to be made but at least we could have left it to them to make it.”

Ruhfus looked to the public as a key factor and blamed too much negative foreign reporting. She said, “We are in a massive trap as news broadcasters. What do we do? We are loosing our audience because we are telling the ugly truth. How do we respond to that? Do we start making the bad news sound good?”

The media’s metamorphosis has prompted aid agencies to create more of their own media bridging the gap between the two. DuBois expressed his belief that traditional forms of media were no longer adequate. “Being detached and neutral does not sell anymore, people want something authentic.”

When the audience joined in the debate, one member called for a separation between conflict relief and disaster aid stating that the public is far less engaged in the former.

Another pressing comparison was made between development versus emergency aid. Svoboda outlined the dilemma of aid agencies regarding this. “You pass from a crisis into this development and state building and you want to believe it and you ignore the facts that it’s not as stable as you want it to be,” she said. She also called for realism and modesty above all else in her field. “Their needs to be honesty about what can be done, and that’s not always easy because aid org need the money to do the work so how do you do that by selling a story.”

Another audience member observed that given the number of critical issues in today’s world the definition of what constitutes a ‘crisis’ is diminishing. Whether it continues to undermine itself is another question. In any case, the evening ended on a positive note with Snow heralding the current ‘golden age of journalism’. While there may not have been clear answers, the right questions had been asked.

You can watch and listen to the event again here:

On Wednesday 1 October, several experts told a crowd at the Frontline Club about the unprecedented and horrific impact that the Ebola epidemic is having in West Africa.

The panel — moderated by Ade Daramy, chair and spokesperson for the UK Sierra Leone Ebola Task Force — tackled the international community’s response to the outbreak and assessed the situation on the ground during the Frontline Club’s First Wednesday: The Fight Against Ebola.

From left: Meinie Nicolai, Professor David Heymann, Ade Daramy, Colin Freeman, Dr Ike Anya and Dr Tim O’Dempsey in conversation at the Frontline Club. Photograph: Mackenzie Weinger

“This is an equal opportunity killer,” Daramy said.

In particular, the experts gathered at the Frontline Club’s discussion zeroed in on the damage the epidemic has inflicted on the health workforce.

Dr Tim O’Dempsey, who was seconded to WHO as clinical lead for the Ebola Treatment Centre in Kenema, Sierra Leone, this summer, told the packed house: “One of the things that probably isn’t on the radar at the moment in terms of the impact of Ebola is the impact on the health workforce and the loss of these very valued members of society.”

“Ebola,” he said, “has torn through the health infrastructure.”

And Meinie Nicolai — president of MSF Belgium and MSF’s operational directorate in Brussels, who recently returned from Liberia and Sierra Leone — called both the scale of MSF’s operations and the outbreak itself entirely “unprecedented”.

MSF is continually reinventing its Ebola response and has even done what they “never do”, which is to call for state actors to come in and get involved, she told the Frontline Club. “Throwing money is way too easy.”

The situation on the ground is absolutely devastating, she said. “People are dying at our front door”.

As for the media response, there have been few journalists on the ground covering this crisis, Colin Freeman, the chief foreign correspondent for the Sunday Telegraph, noted.

Freeman — who recently returned from West Africa and said his time on the ground offered “no shortage of dreadful horror stories” — put it down to the fears this particular virus has raised.

“Stories of this sort ring alarm bells in office health and safety managers because I’ve got to come home to the office and then go in and work in a building with 3,000 people. If I get a bullet wound, it doesn’t matter,” he said.

Still, the nature of Ebola does demand that a journalist do his or her job in a very different fashion, he added. “What you have to do is just make sure nobody comes too near to you, which is the opposite of what you normally do when you’re trying to report and get in people’s confidence,” Freeman said.

And Ebola isn’t slowing down.

“The frightening thing for everybody involved in this is the accelerated epidemic that we’ve seen occurring in Liberia,” O’Dempsey said. “That is likely to be mirrored with about a six-week lag in Sierra Leone.”

But there are areas that offer some hope, he said. “The survivors, I think, are going to be a great asset when it comes to the epidemic response.”

As the evening came to a close, Daramy took a moment to remind the crowd that, “Even in the midst of Ebola, people are making jokes.”

“In Sierra Leone, they don’t shake hands, they touch elbows — and they refer to it as ‘elbowla’,” he said, to laughter from the crowd. “And also, they’re saying in the last few days is that if you don’t want to get Ebola, it’s as easy as ABC, which is ‘Avoid Bodily Contact’. So, you know, people can still smile. They can still smile.”

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