The Framing of Political Parties by the Ethiopian Print Media in the 2010 Parliamentary Election
No Thumbnail Available
Date
2012-06
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Addis Ababa University
Abstract
The main aim of the study was to examine how the Ethiopian print media framed the
political parties of the country during the 2010 Parliamentary Election. The research
employed both quantitative and qualitative approaches. To conduct the study, three
newspapers namely Addis Zemen, Reporter and Awramba Times with a relatively high
coverage of domestic politics and larger circulation, and two contending parties-the
EPRDF and Medrek-which had seats in the parliament were included in the study. The
study included newspapers published within the period of January 15 to May 15, 2010.
Results of the study revealed that the government owned newspaper Addis Zemen
portrayed EPRDF positively, but it portrayed Medrek negatively. On the contrary, the
privately owned newspapers, Reporter (though with some exceptions) and Awramba
Times, portrayed EPRDF negatively, whereas they portrayed Medrek positively.
Awramba Times appeared to favor Medrek while Addis Zemen seemed in favor of the
EPRDF, and this shows that there was biased view in the newspapers which could lead to
less informed and more polarized electorate. However, Reporter was relatively in a neutral
mode. The study also showed that conflict frame, followed by attribution of responsibility
and economic consequence frames, was found to be the most manipulated frame. Finally,
recommendations for further research were forwarded.