They spoke at a regional conference in Accra, Ghana, on the heels of recent coup in Burkina Faso.
Representatives of ECOWAS, academia, journalists and civil society organisations have bemoaned the alarming decline in press freedom and democracy in the West Africa region, and suggested ways to address it.
They called on journalists to be professional and uphold the ethics and ethos of their job.
They also called for more engagements with Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) on how to improve on and implement the body's existing policy documents on human rights, free press and democracy.
They spoke in Accra, Ghana, during the opening of a two-day regional conference on 'The media, press freedom and democratic recession in West Africa,' on Tuesday.
The event, coming on the heels of the recent coup d'état in Burkina Faso, was organised by the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) and the West Africa Democracy Solidarity Network (WADEMOS).
WADEMOS is a newly formed coalition of about 35 pro-democracy CSOs from across the 15 countries in the sub-region.
The event, which drew participants from all the West African countries, was attended by the Head, Democracy and Good Governance and Political Affairs Directorate of the ECOWAS Commission, Eyesan Okorodudu, and the regional body's Resident Representative in Ghana, Baba Gana Wali.
Both of them suggested ways journalists and CSOs could make contributions to ECOWAS policy documents to stop the decline in press freedom, promotion of human rights, enhance accountable journalism and defend democracy in the region.
Since 2020, there have been successful coups in Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso, and failed attempts in Niger and Guinea Bissau. The latest coup in Burkina Faso on 30 September was the second in the country in less than nine months.
Press first casualty of democratic decline
Speaking on the wave of democratic recession in the region, the Project Director of WADEMOS, Kwasi Prempeh, said the media "is one of the first thing to go when democracy begins to retreat and democracy begins to suffer".
"The independent media in West Africa is one of the products and legacies of the wave of democratisation," Mr Prempey, a professor and Executive Director, Centre for Democratic Development (CDD), Ghana, said. "So it is an important institution that needs to be protected".
On his part, the Executive Director of MFWA, Sulemana Braimah, noted that while press freedom is itself a casualty of democratic recession, it is needed in the efforts to restore democratic governance where it has been dislodged in the region.
Kwame Karikari, a professor of journalism and media communication, said in his keynote address that the promising atmosphere of democratic governance in West Africa some years back has since dwindled to a frightening state.
"A few years ago, the atmosphere looked promising enough for many to venture to talk about 'consolidating democracy' in many of our countries.
"Today, we are here - and everywhere else - bemoaning the frightening prospect of 'democratic recession' all over our continent," he said.
'Media under siege'
He also noted that the "independence and freedom of the media are among the first targets of forces of authoritarianism and dictatorship."
"While 'democracy capture' undermines media freedom, independence and pluralism, other factors, external to the media, undermine media and journalists' resolve and capacity to protect citizens' rights and interests against pervasive attacks on democracy. Cyber-bullying, with women journalists usually suffering a more intensive assaults, is rampant in nearly all countries against critical media and voices."
He said the media is currently under siege.
"The methods involve cooptation and repression, carrot and stick means so to say."
With the traditional form of party-owned media generally going out of fashion "leading political forces invest in their own media houses."
He added that in some other countries "media and communications regulatory bodies, ruling parties manipulate licensing processes to have monopoly control allocation of broadcasting facilities, for example."
"Critical media and opposition voices are silenced by a plethora of means. Undemocratic but dormant laws on the statute books are raked up and applied.
"New legislation ostensibly designed to protect the public, such as anti-cyber-crime and anti- terrorist laws, are recent examples," he added.
Recommendations
As part of the solutions, Mr Karikari recommended that journalists "must strive to uphold the high standards of professionalism and fight against the cheap but attractive path of unprofessional conduct".
"That is the only way self-respecting journalists and responsible media organisations can and will earn back the people's trust and confidence," he said.
Mr Karikari added that despite the difficulties, "independent media should continue to report issues of human rights abuses and support social justice causes."
He called on journalists "to forge partnerships and alliances, in-country and across borders, to share publications and programmes designed to expose incidents", in order "to sustain their collective survival and freedom, independent media."
He also advised that "journalists with democratic persuasion must play active roles in their professional associations so as to prevent the high-jacking of their organizations by mercenary agents of the enablers of 'democracy capture'."
ECOWAS contributions
Mr Okorodudu of the ECOWAS Commission, who lamented the challenges of the emergence associated with emergence of citizen journalism, suggested self-regulation mechanism by media practitioners to avert "over-regulation" by the state.
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"With the inroad of citizen journalism, a lot of setbacks have come into the space," he said.
He added that political actors have chosen to use citizens journalism from the backend to promote crisis that even democracy is finding difficult to manage. And because it is within the context of legitimacy of their roles, you can't really questioned it.
He called for a kind of self-regulation mechanism that promotes "positive attributes of what you gain from citizen journalism's contribution with regards to the expansion of the space."
He called on media experts to come up with strategic framework that ECOWAS could borrow from in its efforts to "enhance the respect for rule of law, enhance the respect for human rights."
He also welcomed contributions to the ECOWAS policy document on roles of the media in promoting peace and security.
CSOs' roles
The Projector Coordinator of WADEMOS, Mr Prempeh, charged CSOs to "begin to think locally and act regionally; and also to think regionally and act locally."
"So when you see democracy suffering in one country in the neighbourhood, it means it is time for you to get worried," he said.
He recalled that democracy emerged in West Africa from one country to another country in quick succession.
He said "we are concerned that if we don't band together and begin to think about this", democracy might start taking a reverse from Africa in the same manner.
