Media freedom monitoring
Monitoring media freedom has been one of MISA Lesotho core activities since the organisation’s establishment in 1995.
To do this, we compile and publish accurate and detailed media violations and victories: that is, we record media freedom abuses as well as progress towards a free, independent, diverse and pluralistic media as envisaged by the Windhoek Declaration.
Media violations are issued in the form of alerts to educate people about the nature of the abuse and highlight trends. Alerts can also serve as advocacy tools and inform research to help influence changes to legislation and policy, as well as help bring perpetrators to justice.
Media violations include:
- when journalists are physically or verbally assaulted, threatened, injured, kidnapped, disappear, arrested, killed, censored, denied credentials or wrongfully expelled during the course of their work or as a direct result of their work
- when news outlets are attacked, illegally searched, censored, closed by force, raided, unable to report, broadcast or publish because of factors such as the confiscation of equipment, blocking of their online site or the jamming of transmissions
- when new legislation or changes to legislation hinder journalists from conducting their work freely and without fear.
We use this information to compile the MISA regional report, So this is Democracy? which ranks and measures the performance of Lesotho against other countries in the Southern African region.
Media freedom monitoring news from our chapters
False: Lesotho’s 2026 Census Results Have Not Yet Been Released
The circulating figures are unverified, demographically inaccurate, and do not originate from official data. Nicole Tau A viral Facebook post claiming that Lesotho’s 2026 Population and Housing Census recorded a population of 2.1 million people, including 600,000 men...
From Kigali to Maseru: Rewriting the ‘Invisible Rules’ of Gender, Media, and Power in Lesotho
Nicole Tau Acting National Director, MISA-Lesotho The most powerful barriers are often the ones we cannot see. They don't appear in legislation or constitutions. They live in the questions we ask, the headlines we write, the jokes we laugh at and the expectations we...
PARTLY FALSE: Sherwood Gathering Exceeded 7,000, but Census Data Contradicts Claims of Millions of Malawians in South Africa
Nicole Tau A Facebook post shared on 13 June 2026 claims that the number of Malawian nationals gathered at Sherwood Community Park in Durban surged from 5,000 to 7,000 in a single day. It goes further, alleging that South Africa is home to "MILLIONS”" of undocumented...
The Cost of Silence: Regional dialogue on Journalist Mental Health and Media Leadership
By Ts'epang Lenka On 19 March 2026, the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Lesotho convened a regional online dialogue bringing together journalists, editors, media leaders, and mental health professionals from across Southern Africa. Titled “The Cost of...
Cost of Silence: Journalists Speak Out on Threats, Trauma and the Need for Care
By Liteboho Matela "Journalists, don’t make it to the newspapers unless it’s for the wrong reasons." It was a heavy line to open the room; half warning, half confession. It became clear that this was not going to be a typical media event with prepared remarks and...