The IPPR has been monitoring the coverage of the parties on NBC television news and One Africa television news over the past week. These are the results for the week from October 30 to November 5 for election-related coverage of the parties on NBC TV:
Swapo 82%
Swanu 4%
DTA 4%
APP 4%
RP 4%
Nudo 2%
Notes: Swapo had 40 minutes out of a total 49 minutes of coverage of parties over the week. This amounted to 17 separate items.Some of the coverage of the opposition had a noticeably negative slant. For example the only coverage of the DTA was a rally cancellation, while coverage of the RP focussed on internal disputes.
For One Africa, these were the results:
Swapo 50%
DPN 14%
Nudo 14%
RDP 14%
APP 7%
Notes: One Africa with shorter news broadcasts and no news slots at the weekend devoted much less time to the elections. Swapo had 7 minutes of coverage out of a total of 14 devoted to parties.
Election Watch is a project of the Institute for Public Policy Research in Windhoek, Namibia.