Hélène DOUBIDJI is a multi-award-winning field journalist and founder of two media outlets, notably Togotopnews (www.togotopnews.com), a general news website, and EkinaMag (www.ekinamag.com), a feminist web magazine. She is also the current president of the Togolese Association of Private Online Media Outlets (ATOPPEL).
She worked with several local newspapers before launching her first media outlet, TogoTopNews, in 2014, with the aim of creating a media outlet that combines traditional journalism with new editorial formats. In 2018, the media outlet was selected by the French Development Agency CFI and named one of the eleven best Pure Players in Africa as part of its New Online Information Actors in Africa (NAILA) initiative.
A passionate field journalist, she covers a wide range of topics with a particular interest in issues with a strong social impact and topics related to women.
Her in-depth reporting has earned her awards and nominations at both the national and international levels, the most recent of which are the Accer AWARD (2021), presented by the Pan-African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA); the Regional Grand Prize for Gender-Sensitive Journalism (2020), awarded by the Panos Institute West Africa (IPAO); and the "Lauriers du Journalisme d'Impact au Togo" (2018), awarded by the embassies of France, Germany, the United States, the European Union, and the United Nations System in Togo.
Beyond journalism, she participates in and covers several major international meetings, including the Regional Symposium on Women's Access to Information in Senegal in December 2020; the Media Development Forum in France in December 2019; the African Women in Dialogue (AFWID) Forum in South Africa in November 2019; the Kavli Week scientific conference in Norway in 2016; and the 21st World Climate Conference in Paris, France, in December 2015.
Can you tell us about Ekinamag? What is its editorial line? What types of content are available? How is the media outlet supplied with content
?
So I legally created EkinaMag in December 2020. It's worth explaining that the word "Ekina" refers to "young girl" in "Ifè," which is a local language spoken in certain areas of Togo.
Accessible via www.ekinamag.com
, EkinaMag is a feminist web magazine, a 100% digital media outlet committed to fighting sexism and gender-based violence and promoting women's rights. The media outlet highlights the successes and initiatives of girls and women, while emphasizing the challenges and obstacles they face.
Ekinamag aims to achieve SDG 5, which contributes to "achieving gender equality and empowering all women and girls."
The magazine offers written, audio, and video content and is organized around six main themes: women's rights and gender-based violence; empowerment; female leadership; positive masculinity; female entrepreneurship; and health and sexuality.
It should be noted that Ekinamag does not feature any of the traditional sections found in women's magazines, such as "cooking," "decoration," "beauty," "makeup," etc. In our opinion, such content only reinforces existing stereotypes, in that it perpetuates the image of women as seductresses, objects, or kitchen helpers.
All our content is accessible to everyone free of charge because we believe that information is a common good that should be shared. Although we are a media outlet committed to a specific cause, our publications are freely accessible and must remain so in order to reach a wide audience without restriction. Anyone can read and comment on our publications, whether on our website or on social media. Speaking of social media, EkinaMag is active on all the major platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.
The media outlet is regularly updated with content produced exclusively by its editorial team, which consists of six permanent journalists and several contributing journalists.
How would you describe your audience? What age group? Beyond Togo, do you have a pan-African audience?
In terms of audience, since November 2022 we have had between 20,000 and 33,000 users per month. This is a significant increase compared to previous months.
Approximately 60% of EkinaMag readers are men, compared to 40% women. Our readership is aged between 18 and 44. The 18-24 age group accounts for 38%, the 25-34 age group accounts for 37%, and the 35-44 age group accounts for 15%.
In terms of the countries that follow us, Togo is obviously in first place, with neighboring Benin in second place, followed by France, Côte d'Ivoire, and Senegal, respectively. These are the top five countries that follow EkinaMag.
Why did you choose to launch a feminist media outlet? What are your ambitions?
The idea to set up this media outlet first came about in 2018, following a deeply moving encounter with a young orphan girl of about 16 who had been abused, raped, and impregnated by her aunt's husband, with whom she was living.
Deeply moved by her story, I had the idea of setting up a media outlet dedicated exclusively to reporting on these issues, which are rarely covered by the mainstream media but constitute a real social problem that is ignored, with victims and survivors being despised and ostracized.
The idea was born, but it wasn't until I was invited to the Media Development Forum in Paris by CFI in 2019 that I had the big push to take action. Among the topics discussed at this international meeting was "feminism in the media."This gave me a clear direction for my idea, which was still in its infancy, and allowed me to move on to the project stage.
I therefore decided to position the media as a feminist magazine, since when you analyze the media environment in Togo, you realize that women are presented in a stereotypical way in the media. They are rarely cited as experts, consultants, or specialists; instead, they are heavily involved in sexist advertising and content. Feminist concerns are rarely addressed by the media, and the issue of gender equality is often not dealt with in depth.
Our ambition is to have a media outlet that deconstructs clichés and stereotypes, challenges the patriarchal order, promotes a more positive image of women, and defends the ideology that women and men are equal.
What is the place of feminist movements in the African media today?
As I pointed out above, feminist issues are of little interest to the media, particularly in Africa. Media programs, headlines, and columns reveal above all a male-dominated world. Feminist movements are often criticized by the media. In general, relevant women's issues occupy little space in media content. The topics about women that are often covered in the media generally concern: the commemoration of women's issues days; a few reports on the activities of women's associations and the launch of women's initiatives; informative articles such as annual statistics on pregnancy in schools and the percentage of girls taking school exams; and unusual topics and news items related to women.
The sixth report of the Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP, 2020), a global initiative to monitor editorial content, confirmed this. A total of 30,172 pieces of content published in newspapers, broadcast in the audiovisual media, on news websites, and via tweets from news media were examined. Globally, only 25% of the content analyzed referred to women as subjects and sources of information, an increase of 1% compared to 2010. At this rate, it will take "67 years" to achieve gender balance in media content globally, according to the GMMP's sixth report.
You have just won the Francophone Media Innovation Award. What does this distinction mean for the development of your activities?
This distinction is a great gift from heaven that came at just the right time. Since its creation, EkinaMag has developed its activities mainly through self-financing. The OIF's funding will therefore help us consolidate our activities and logistics and initiate new projects in order to establish EkinaMag on a sustainable basis. We have several projects planned for 2023, including a digital campaign against gender-based violence and sexual harassment, four series of portraits of women working in traditionally male-dominated fields, a web series entitled "I am a man and committed to the cause of women," and a project on "women and sport."
What are your short-, medium-, and long-term ambitions?
In the short term, to firmly establish EkinaMag by launching several projects; in the medium term, to have correspondents in countries in the sub-region; and in the long term, to replicate the initiative in several African countries.