The Price of Being Silent Witnesses
Photojournalists must tell the visual story; that is their job. But nobody hears their stories of the personal cost of their jobs on their consciences and their souls.
HARARE, Zimbabwe—It took only minutes for the 1994 Pulitzer Prize-winning feature photograph of a collapsed frail, famine-starved child, hungrily eyed by a hooded vulture to illicit an outcry of disdain and horror from the readers of the New York Times when it was first published on March 26, 1993, writes Patience Ukama
The horror was a response to a question of ethics on the part of the photographer, South African Kevin Carter.
Questions raised included if it was ethical for him to prioritise a picture over a child’s welfare.
Whether he should have intervened and helped the child instead of taking the photograph.
Even today, there are probably as many opinions as there are questions about this image.
This struck a cord while leading a DanChurchAid intervention capturing community accounts of climate loss and damage in affected communities with local and international journalists in Eastern Zimbabwe struck by Cyclone Idai in 2009 and Southern Malawi devastated by Cyclone Freddy in February 2023.
This rings true of imagery from Cyclone Chido at the beginning of December 2024, the floods in Tanzania that resulted in 150 deaths in April 2024, and the heavy rains in Kenya, Somalia, and other parts of Africa.
It drew to mind images of Amélia, the woman from Mozambique who gave birth in a mango tree during floods that killed 700 people in that country in February/March 2000.
Ironically, that image of her now-adult baby, draped in dirty linen, being recused by a helicopter, helped raise millions of dollars for affected people.
The implication is that journalists and journalism can equally be catalysts for good, elevating the plight of the otherwise voiceless in the remotest parts of the continent onto the global stage, soliciting assistance, and raising awareness.
Critics say that through that photograph, Kevin Carter increased society’s awareness of injustice using perspective, exposure, and connotation to accentuate the consequences of famine on an impoverished child.
Allowing the world to see that extreme malnutrition essentially renders animal life superior to the weakest in society, our children.
It was later revealed that the child was attempting to reach a United Nations feeding centre a kilometre away in Ayod, now South Sudan, and to have survived the incident.
On the other hand, Carter committed suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning, said to have been prompted by mental anguish according to his suicide letter, four short months after receiving the prestigious award.
Photojournalists must tell the visual story; that is their job. But nobody hears their stories of the personal cost of their jobs on their consciences and their souls.
While social media appears to have dulled our senses and numbed us to human suffering, the journalists whose job it is to tell the story must still tell the story.
Thoko Chikondi, an award-winning female photojournalist from Malawi, reflected on her job, saying, "I have many questions about this job. Do we help people? You see the suffering, but you cannot help. Even if I have K10,000 (approximately US$5) in my pocket, the rules of the job say I cannot give it to them."
Over the years, Thoko has covered health pandemics, including local cholera outbreaks and COVID-19, where the risk to herself and her health has been high.
But that is the price the silent witness must pay to tell the world the story. She has seen a hospital—the only hospital for miles—filled with sand deposited as if out of nowhere by Cyclone Freddy, and medical staff scrambling, unable to assist as patients died.
She has heard the anguish of mothers who have lost and those still searching for their children during mudslides. She has felt the plight of those left homeless, having lost every single one of their worldly possessions in a flash.
She has witnessed mass burials and the torment of grief on those left behind.
She recounted being drenched in torrential rain carrying her camera on her head tightly wrapped in a plastic bag while wading through chest-deep "angry" flood waters, unsure of her next step in the cold, night.
Young men from the community lifted her on their shoulders to take the pictures that graced the covers of newspapers around the world, bringing news of the devastating human impact of Cyclone Freddy.
"I don't know if you can say they did it because they understood that my job and those pictures would help them, or if it was just human kindness. These crises seem to bring out the humanity in people," said Thoko.
It’s been 30 years since the iconic image that preceded "The Vulture and the Little Girl" saga.
Where does the world stand today on photographic and journalist ethics? Where is the outcry and disdain at the visual stories of injustice and climate change horrors?
There is no global assistance coming to address not just the socio-economic devastation but the accompanying mental anguish of those affected, impacted, and those who survived.
Africa's overdependence on aid is a story for another day, but how COP29 failed Africa in such a dramatic fashion when the world has seen the images of death and destruction amounting to millions and billions per incident, per village, predominantly affecting the world’s poorest, makes it clear that it is time for Africa to rally together and focus on implementing the African Union Climate Strategy towards achieving the long-awaited African solution.
For now, this unaddressed burden simply means that the silent witnesses must continue to live with this unimaginable toll of the continent’s pain and continue to do their jobs at whatever personal cost to their souls.
I suppose what's fair and just is also then a topic for another day.
Patience is a governance and communications specialist; she heads communications for DanChurchAid Zimbabwe, the lead partner of the Utariri integrated biodiversity, climate change, and livelihoods programme across the Zambezi Valley.
She started her career as a journalist and has served as Editor for the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, and was Head of Communications for the African Union Foundation.