The scandal has killed off Britain’s best selling newspaper, the “News of the World”. Pressure mounted on the paper since it emerged that employees (journalists, editors and the like) of the paper hacked the mobile phone of murdered 15-year old Milly Dowler.  

Also up to 4,000 people, including the relatives of July the 7^th, 2005 London bombing victims and of British soldiers killed abroad, may have been targeted.  This hacking scandal, which has been described by some British politicians as a stain on the character of ‘British journalism’, may undermine to a greater extent the calls for keeping the press “as free as possible”.

The history of the British press, like that in African countries, has been a history of fighting for press freedom on the political, cultural and social front. Journalists and writers have been through bitter battles throughout this century to get their right of free expression. Since it has been a fight strongly resisted by those hungry for trimming the nails of the press, the current British phone hacking scandal has to a larger extent in my opinion, undermined the battle for press freedom among those calling for freedom.

Today the world press has to meet new challenges; it has to interact, actively and positively with new national and international realities. For this to work effectively, freedom of expression should be kept as untouchable as possible.

There is  now need more than ever  to sharpen the skills of investigative journalists in an effort to make their  operations  more cleaner and devoid of covert phone hacking techniques, as well as the employment of the services of private investigators in the pursuit of a story, as in the case of the “News of the World”. The second challenge facing journalists is technological; the tools produced by the new communication technology increase the challenge of competition not only for the British press, but for the press almost everywhere in the world.

This leads to another challenge:  if Journalists are to avoid committing devastating breaches of journalistic ethics like what the “News of the World” did, media barons like Rupert Murdoch and chief executives like Rebekah Brooks need to make an effort to equip journalists who work for their papers with not only the skills to deal with new techniques of the trade, but also with tools to make use of the large margin of freedom available without abusing it.

According to my observations, this is important in view of the fact that the press has its enemies and the best way to fight back is to develop the newsgathering skills and the tools of the journalist, in an effort to avoid scandals like that at the “News of the World” that has sadly resulted in over 200 people losing their jobs.

Moving on the issue of fair press, it is my view that fair press issues should go hand in hand with objectivity. Both are essential elements in doing journalism.

It is my opinion that journalists and editors should establish this concept of objectivity without blocking the press from doing its job in the best way possible.

Failure to do this would surely result in history blaming journalists and editors for ignoring our responsibilities of informing the public in a fair and objective manner.