The president of the Journalists Union of Guinea-Bissau, Indira Correia Baldé, asked Guinean journalists to be professional and not to spread hateful and radical speeches during the electoral campaign for the legislative elections on June 4.
“What we are going to ask our members is to be more and more professional. If we don’t do a professional job, we run the risk of not doing a good job, neither for the class, nor for the politicians that we are following”, said Indira Correia Baldé to the media in Bissau.
The electoral campaign for the legislative elections in Guinea-Bissau began on Saturday and will run until June 2.
Guinean civil society has urged Guinean political parties and leaders to avoid hate speeches that incite ethnic and religious division in the country, after “several exaggerations” were registered in the last elections, Indira Correia Baldé said. “We have to be more attentive, know how to scrutinize the speeches, if we register any dose of radicalism, any dose of encouragement to hatred and violence, that we leave aside”, said the president of the Journalists Union.
Indira Correia Baldé stressed that what interests the people is “to hear the parties’ programs,” asking the Guinean press to do the “maximum” for voters to know the proposals of political leaders.
The Union of Journalists of Guinea-Bissau also expressed concern about the lack of financial means for the media to cover the electoral campaign. Two coalitions and 20 political parties started Saturday the electoral campaign for Guinea-Bissau’s seventh legislative elections, after the Guinean parliament was dissolved almost a year ago.
According to the final voter registration data presented by the Technical Support Office for the Electoral Process, a total of 893,618 voters have been registered, of whom 459,609 are women and 434,009 are men.