In 2021, Minority Africa – a digital publication telling minority stories across Africa – embarked on a journey to broaden perceptions of the term ‘minority.’ The team recognized that publishing stories about marginalised groups was only one step in their journey to create an inclusive media ecosystem across Africa.
It had become increasingly evident that mainstream African media frequently perpetuated biases and leaned on detrimental stereotypes when depicting minority communities. This not only led to a distortion of these groups’ realities but also restricted their access to comprehensive and accurate content that authentically represented their experiences.
Reflecting on those transformative moments, Patricia Kisesi, Duty Editor at Minority Africa, shared, “We found ourselves in a bar, discussing the future of Minority Africa. As we scribbled down various ideas on a napkin, the concept of establishing a platform that curates stories from across the continent for media outlets to select and publish emerged as a standout idea.”
The outcome of that conversation was “Advance,” a way to extend and spread Minority Africa’s coverage to legacy and niche media platforms in hopes of creating a more inclusive Africa media.
“Since 2021, we’ve worked with a handful of newsrooms who have republished our content and helped bring to life our dream to disseminate these stories,” Kisesi says. “Nonetheless, it struck us very quickly that we would need some technological magic wand if we were going to work with more newsrooms.”
Winning the Google News Innovation Challenge in 2022 was the magic wand in question. It allowed Minority Africa to realise its vision and create a web application that connects individuals and organisations passionate about disseminating minority narratives, known as “Advancers,” with dedicated “Publishers” who cover and report on these crucial stories.
With its foundation deeply rooted in open access and guided by the principles of Creative Commons, Advance which launched in August 2023 is not just a platform but a movement that seeks to transform journalism through innovation and inclusivity.
This initiative, a remarkable leap forward for inclusive journalism, promises to reshape how minority stories from across Africa are told and shared. Since it began in 2019, Minority Africa has covered over 120 stories across 17 African countries, worked with over 200 journalists and reached an audience of more than three million people. Yet, this is not enough according to Shameer Ramdin, Growth and Partnership Manager and the Project Lead of Advance.
“Africa is a region characterised by its diverse cultures, languages, and traditions but many stories of minority communities often remain untold or underrepresented. At Minority Africa, we believe that heterogeneity is a societal must in constructing an inclusive and just world,” he says.
At the heart of Advance’s innovation is its commitment to disrupting traditional journalism by offering a symbiotic relationship to its users. It operates under an open-access framework where the stories published are accessible to the audience not only to read but also to share and repurpose with proper attribution.
“By including minority voices in decision-making and policy formulation, we can build a society and systems that looks out for the whole of the people by integrating multiple diverse lenses of perspectives and collaboration,” Ramdin says. “This is why we conceptualised Advance to translate this vision through technological innovation.”
The spirit of collaboration, innovation and inclusivity that embodies Advance is a reflection of the Pan-African team that works in conceptualising it. By breaking down geographical barriers, the team spread across Botswana, Lesotho, Mauritius, Nigeria and South Africa fused cutting-edge technology and journalistic integrity dawning a new era for news agencies for marginalised groups.
“This is just the beginning,” says Ramdin. “We are going to push the boundaries of this news agency in the coming years by integrating AI technology for fact-checking and leveraging blockchain technology to ensure the permanence of our content and those of our users.”
So far, the platform has over 40 advancers from across 7 countries but the goal is to grow those numbers alongside the geographic and thematic scope of Advancers.
“It is very exciting to see this project take shape,” Kisesi says. “My hope is that one day seeing minority stories in mainstream media becomes more commonplace rather than occasional.”
Join the new wave of Journalists, Storytellers, Newsrooms and others changing the narrative of marginalised Africans across the globe, sign up to Advance today.