Online Newspapers, Live TV Channels, Radios

Congo is an African country and been suffering from a wide number of troubles and issues for past years. Media outlets in the country are made with print and broadcast media. The presence of web-based media outlets is almost nil. On the other side, the existing media outlets in the country struggle with many other issues including the national politics. They are not allowed to express their thoughts to the public. A very reserved attitude is shown by the government for the media outlets. So, operating the media outlets against the political power is a big challenge for them.

The most critical issue is the violation of freedom of speech for the journalists in the country. Often the journalists are not allowed to express freely. When they want to express something against the government, the government starts punishing them. Many of the journalists are the subject of threat or arrest. Sometimes, they are physically tortured and even killed. And everything goes unnoticed. The journalist’s family spend time in a kind of mental instability about their journalist family members.

Despite the worrisome situations, the media outlets always criticize the government policy. Even they publish news and views that go against the government. In fact, by this way, the media in the country is establishing itself as an entity that will not tolerate the government repression. Besides, some of the media outlets have their own political connection that they use to deal with such matter. And the number of state-owned media outlets is fewer in comparison to the privately owned outlets. So, the state-owned houses are unable to compete with the private media houses.

Radio is accessible by almost all types of people but the print media outlets are not so popular in the country. This happens mostly for the massive illiteracy rate across the country. Hence, most of the people are reluctant to read newspapers which results in low newspaper readership. Besides, people also love to enjoy television shows and a notable number of television channels broadcast a good number of shows and events. The newspapers are published using the local language and English is rarely used here because people do not have command of the language.

The media climate in the country is not up to the mark because of many reasons including the poor literacy rate, socio-political conflicting issues, geography and more. Majority of the people are busy with their survival and have less time for accessing the media outlet to know about the national and international news and information.

Around 20 newspapers are operational in the country and they come with a wide number of news and views for their readers. But sometimes the newspapers maintain a self-censorship to survive. They never reveal any secret information that may cause a threat to state security. The newspapers are mostly published in the local language and a remarkable number of them have become dysfunctional.

Four television channels are broadcasting across the nation and they broadcast a wide range of news and shows for the countrywide audience. Most of the television channels broadcast in the African language. But access to television is not available for everyone in the country due to their poor socio-economic condition.

Radio is one of the most popular media outlets and the majority of the population have their access to radio. They listen to different types of programs and events in radio and the radio stations operate round the clock. They come with the local languages to attract the audiences’ attention.

The use of the internet is notable but most of the cases people use the internet for their social communication. The use of the internet for news and information is not practiced in the country to a substantial extent.