Briefs

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Provincial
Communications Workshop

Since 1991, Anglican Communicators have not come together to evaluate the emerging changes in the field of communication especially in information technology. The Unit organized a four-day workshop in Nairobi in October 2002 for all Communication Directors from the entire Continent.

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Keynote speech of the Anglican Archbishop and Bishop of All Saint’s Diocese, The Most Rev. Benjamin Mwanzia Nzimbi.More

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ALBERT WANDAGO: Telling Africa Story Through Film
Albert shares the same view with Teshombe abriel, of the University of California’s Media Department.More

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....Under Construction

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Speech by AACC interim General Secretary Mr. Melaku Kifle at the closing ceremony of the Anglican Communication workshop organised by Council of Anglican Provinces of Africa (CAPA)
October 31, 2002 - Nairobi

CAPA, General Secretary
Ladies and Gentlemen,

We at the All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC) were enthralled by the CAPA invitation which gave us the honour of performing the closing ceremony of this workshop.

Our appreciation is based on two key reasons. One is that AACC belongs to you. It is your regional ecumenical organisation. Your churches give meaning to the AACC fellowship which now comprise 168 national churches in 39 African countries with a congregational membership of over 100 million Christians in Africa. Our associate members include 26 national Christian councils.

The second reason for our gratitude is the significance of this workshop. Our churches and ecumenical movement can never gain the visibility they deserve without you, the Christian communicators and the Christian media.

For this reason, we extend our gratitude to CAPA and CAPA partners for organising such skills training workshop, which we view as essential capacity building effort necessary to propel the Church in Africa cope with the demands of modern time.

Talking of modern times, we are conscious that we live in the information age. The Church is part of that age and can no longer ignore the communication ministry for many reasons one of which is the fact that the message from the Church must reach the public sphere and that can only be possible when the Church adopts the use of public communication media managed by our own communications.

Secondly, communication is relational. It requires at least two people to communicate. This communication builds bridges and human relationships. As the Church in Africa engages in peace and reconciliation, the value of communication ministry becomes supreme.

We at AACC would like to call on you and the rest of Christian communicators to develop what we would refer to as “peace journalism”. The kind of journalism that would play a front-line role in peace-building as opposed to journalism that stimulates conflicts. We need journalism that promotes human understanding instead of journalism that breaks families and promotes ethnic tensions. The kind of journalism we need in Africa and indeed in the world is journalism that acknowledges that human kind comes first and journalism second.

This is the kind of journalism we want, accordingly we are all challenged, as churches and the ecumenical movement, to be fully involved in media development.

It is for this reason too, that the CAPA initiative is commendable.

Thank you.