He who Pays the Piper, Calls the Tune: Ownership and Editorial Control within Select Private Radio Stations in Zambia

Abstract

This paper proceeds from a study done on control and dictation of editorial content within selected media houses in Zambia. The overarching intention of the researchers was to interrogate the statement “he who pays the piper, calls the tune” within the Zambiamedia context, with specific focus on radio stations in Zambia. The aim was to gain an insight into the assertion that owners, who are often times the financiers of these media concerns do interefere with and dictate the decision making processes for editorial content being churned out from the radio stations. This study was an attmept at answering the question, does the one who pays the piper really call the tune within the Zambian media context? Granted the owners were in the habit of dictating content for whatever motivations, the status quowould be a very sharp contrast to the contention that Zambia was a deomocratic polity thatmust allow for the independence of the press with muzzling either from outside or within the media establishments. In order to collect information useful for the study, a total of ten (10) private radio stations were sampled and professional journalists, either managing the concerns, the news or responsible for collecttng media content were interviewed. Narrative analysis was used to evaluate the information gathered from the interview. It was established that indeed editorial content in radio stations was being dictated by the owners and/or financiers.