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Fatou Lo, the UN Women Representative and Chairperson of the United Nations Communication Group (UNCG) for Zimbabwe has urged the media to focus on human interest stories in their coverage to promote sustainable development.
She was addressing a UN-Media Seminar on Development Reporting on 21 November 2024 in Masvingo after the journalists had concluded a tour of the Bwanya and Mushandike Irrigation Schemes in the province as evidence to demonstrate that the United Nations Development System in Zimbabwe actively supports a robust media landscape that ensures accurate, timely, and objective reporting on development, recovery, and humanitarian issues.
“In your feedback about the tour, you did not dwell on the UN. You went straight to the people, and they are the ones we serve. They are our bosses. It’s about accountability to the people. Whatever we do, it’s for the people. And when I look at those four pillars standing right behind us, peace, people, planet, and prosperity, this is what it is about. So for me, it was very compelling that you went about sharing your memories and had nothing to say about who did it, but rather who benefited from it.
“So it tells us a lot because as UN agencies, we like to communicate around mandates. I’m the head of UN Women. I’ll always be defined by that. And I always want to speak of that. It is normal. It’s part of the job. But to see the perception, including from the media, who need stories, who need sometimes just very snappy stories that they can report on, that in itself is feedback. So I listened to each and every one of you, and I tried to cluster what you said. And what you said was people, transformation, resilience, and inclusion, which go hand in hand with this. We leave no one behind in the principle of the SDGs. You spoke of renewed hope,” Fatou said.
The UNCG leader said she was excited by the journalists’ focus on aspects like gender-based violence (GBV) and education for children and how they are interlinked with economic empowerment, espousing the sustainable development goals (SDGs),
“The SDGs are a whole, and everything is linked. And that’s why I appreciate even more that you did not go downhill and spoke of this agency did this, or that donor-funded that. That’s how we look at it. But to the people, it’s about transformation. It’s about their lives. It’s about their dignity. So thank you for capturing that so powerfully. I listened and I took note of everything you said. And the focus was very clear.
“It was about irrigation schemes that are now going to prevent hunger. It was about a man with a disability who joined a group in farming and had a better outlook on life. It’s about using the SDGs. It’s about linking your reporting to the SDGs. This is why we came together. We came together so that we could build understanding and common ground and have the same reference point. And I believe that’s what the SDGs provide, going to my second point. The SDGs are our reference point in the development world, and actually in the entire world,” Lo said.
She added that the SDG agenda was built with a very deliberate effort to make it inclusive, to make it interconnected, but also make it something that the entire world could rally around.
The UNCG Chair reiterated the need to continue to rally around the excellent SDGs framework, which is a rallying cry for the world to prioritize actions and initiatives to attain the 2030 Agenda.
