“Watchdogging” Versus Adversarial Journalism by State-Owned Media: The Nigerian and Cameroonian Experience

The private and the opposition-controlled media have most often been taxed by Black African governments with being adepts of adversarial journalism. This accusation has been predicated on the observation that the private media have, these last decades, tended to dogmatically interpret their watchdog role as being an enemy of government. Their adversarial inclination has made them to “intuitively” suspect government and to view government policies as schemes that are hardly – nay never – designed in good faith. Based on empirical understandings, observations and secondary sources, this paper argues that the same accusation may be made against most Black African governments which have overly converted the state-owned media to their public relation tools and as well as an arsenal to lambaste their political opponents at the least opportunity. Using Nigeria and Cameroon as case study, this paper examines the facets and implications of adversarial journalism by the state-owned media. It argues that this adversarial culture has mainly involved the governments of both countries utilizing the state-owned media outlets as their respective mouthpieces and as hunting dogs against any internal and external oppositional voice. The prevalence of such an adversarial culture in these state-owned media has obviously affected their potential to effectively serve as watchdogs; thereby making state-owned media to lose their credibility in the eyes of the general public and international observers.