Twenty years after the Windhoek Declaration on press freedom

In Uganda almost 90% of <strong>the</strong>
newspaper sales are through roadside
vendors and supermarkets, not
through subscription.
We contracted a company to handle
<strong>the</strong> distribution chain, but in <strong>the</strong>
absence of close monitoring as
we all buried ourselves in editorial
work, <strong>the</strong> dealer stopped remitting
<strong>the</strong> money and we took long to
notice it. Almost $20,000 was lost.
We had to end <strong>the</strong> contract and
plunge into <strong>the</strong> unfamiliar territory
of newspaper circulation.
With regard to advertising, we
thought an advert in <strong>the</strong> paper was
as good as money but we were to
learn much later that this wasn’t <strong>the</strong>
case. Some of <strong>the</strong> adverts had no
proper orders. Some unscrupulous
sales staff had taken advantage of
our inexperience to place adverts
irregularly. Most of such adverts
would become bad debts.
“A lot of readers
continue to
compliment our
quality product and
our resilience in a
difficult market.”
All <strong>the</strong>se challenges we withstood,
but <strong>the</strong> challenge we were most
unprepared for was <strong>the</strong> death
of our managing editor/director,
<strong>the</strong> man who had led us into this
project, just one year and a half into
<strong>the</strong> venture. He fell sick suddenly in
October 2005, and was dead within
three weeks. Many people, including
some of our own partners, were
certain that this was <strong>the</strong> end of <strong>the</strong>
road. It was hard enough with him,
but without him? Never<strong>the</strong>less I
stepped forward and tried to steady
<strong>the</strong> ship amid <strong>the</strong>se waves of doubt.
Looking back at what we have
100 | Media in Africa - 2011
achieved, I would say it was really
hard for our reporters and sales
staff to introduce <strong>the</strong>mselves to
people who had not heard of <strong>the</strong>
new publication. The conversation
would go like this: “Hello, I am James
calling from The Weekly Observer”.
The reply would be something like:
“What is that?”
Now almost everyone in Uganda
knows <strong>the</strong> paper and what it stands
for. A lot of readers continue to
compliment our quality product and
our resilience in a difficult market.
Since our inception, <strong>the</strong> newspaper
has become a bi-weekly and thus
changed its name to The Observer.
We have moved out of <strong>the</strong> oneroom
office into a two-storey office
building, and consolidated our market
position as a credible alternative
newspaper.
One cannot talk about newspapers in
Uganda today without mentioning
The Observer, mostly in a good light.
Considering <strong>the</strong> humble beginnings,
that positive brand awareness is in
my view our single most important
achievement.
However, being journalists, balancing
business interests and journalism
remains a challenge as <strong>the</strong> two
are often in conflict. Many times we
have had to jeopardise our business
interests so as to uphold our journalistic
duty. Doing that when <strong>the</strong>re
are operational costs to pay is not
easy. Yet running a newspaper is
almost synonymous with incredible
overheads in printing, salaries and
distribution costs, among o<strong>the</strong>rs.