By Enock Sithole
When foreign cash arrives at newsrooms and journalism schools it buys more than laptops and travel: it buys ideas about what journalism should be, and sometimes who should be listened to.
Since the University of Cape Town’s 2019 survey of media aid warned that “aid can be used to coerce journalists to change their norms and practices unduly,” researchers and newsroom insiders have been watching two different funding models collide on the continent — Western donors who champion watchdog journalism, and Chinese actors who favour infrastructure, training and more positive coverage of China-Africa ties.
We have taken a look at on-the-ground case studies from Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa showing how those money flows have shaped journalism education and editorial life, and how abrupt U.S. funding withdrawals under the Trump administration have widened the gaps.
Nigeria — investigative boosts, fragile business models
Nigeria has been a prime recipient of Western journalism support through donor grants and NGO partnerships that have fuelled big investigative projects, courtroom reporting fellowships and data journalism training. This has enabled outlets to expose corruption and organised crime in ways local budgets rarely permit.
At the same time, China’s footprint is visible. Chinese state media and content-sharing agreements as well as scholarships to study in China, have expanded in recent years. Platforms such as China Radio International broadcast in Hausa, a dominant language in northern Nigeria, and training exchanges have introduced many Nigerian reporters to Chinese media practices.
These programmes are less about adversarial investigation and more about skills exchange and positive framing of Sino-Nigerian projects. However, analysts flag the risk that when local outlets or journalists depend on externally funded fellowship travel or project grants, editorial choices can shift toward donor priorities, whether those donors are Western NGOs prioritising anti-corruption or Chinese institutions emphasising development narratives.
The Trump-era U.S. funding freeze has had tangible consequences. With Washington pausing key aid lines, many Nigerian outlets and civil-society partners saw budget shortfalls, with some investigative projects temporarily curtailed, while newsrooms cut staff or delayed training cycles. The result is a thinner investigative capacity and a danger that state or commercially aligned outlets will fill reporting gaps.
Kenya — infrastructure stories and the expanding Chinese presence
In Kenya, Chinese broadcasting and platform companies, for example, satellite/broadcast partners such as StarTimes and partnerships with state media, have become highly visible.
Research shows Chinese state media maintains dozens of bureaus and employs hundreds of staff across Africa, producing steady coverage that foregrounds infrastructure projects and investment successes. Chinese training programmes and scholarships have reached thousands of African media professionals, furthering networks that offer an alternative model of reporting — one that tends to foreground development narratives and official sources.
Western support has historically targeted capacity building in investigative reporting workshops, digital-security training for at-risk reporters, and university partnerships that bring Western syllabi and exchange programmes into Kenyan journalism departments. These programmes have lifted technical skill levels but also introduced a tension — imported models of “watchdog” journalism do not always map onto political environments where access to officials, legal protections and press freedom are constrained.
That misalignment often forces Kenyan newsrooms to choose between donor-driven priorities and survival in a contested media market.
The Trump administration’s decision to suspend major USAID funding rippled through Kenya’s civil-society and media sectors. Health and education programmes were the headline casualties, but media training and grants were also affected as budgets were reprioritised or frozen, leaving fewer resources for investigative fellowships and safety training that had protected journalists reporting on sensitive topics. Observers warned that the vacuum could be exploited by other actors offering financing with strings attached. (UNAIDS).
South Africa — strong institutions, contested curricula
South Africa’s relatively mature media ecosystem and its universities have made the country a hub for regional journalism training. Projects such as the Africa–China Reporting Project (ACRP), hosted at the Wits Centre for Journalism and other South African centres, have provided fellowships, cross-border workshops and reporting grants often funded by a mix of Western foundations, universities and research grants. These programmes have helped develop beats like climate, extractives and data journalism across the region.
China’s engagement in South Africa is more institutional and diplomatic in the form of large media cooperation agreements, state media partnerships and training exchanges aimed at journalists and media managers.
Studies estimate that thousands of African media professionals have been trained through China-led initiatives, and Chinese media infrastructure donations or loans have favoured state broadcasters in the past. Scholars caution that China’s model emphasises constructive, government-aligned narratives which are useful for training in technical production but problematic if it crowds out critical investigative norms
The Trump funding cuts hit South African projects too. Pretoria’s ministries and civil-society groups warned that replacing the lost U.S. financing would be impossible within existing national budgets.
Many university exchange programmes, research partnerships and training grants were paused or scaled back while organisers scrambled for alternative funders. The broader effect was a sobering reminder that journalism education and media projects built on fragile donor flows are vulnerable to geopolitical shifts.
The Consequences for editorial independence and journalism education
Across the three countries a pattern emerges: Western funding tends to sustain watchdog capacity and investigative skillsets, while Chinese funding provides access, infrastructure and a narrative frame that emphasises development and cooperation.
Both expand professional skills, but both can — intentionally or not — shape editorial priorities and curricula. As the UCT study argued years ago, aid can influence norms and practices. The precipitous U.S. funding withdrawals illustrated the other side of dependency that sudden exits destabilise outlets and training pipelines and open space for alternative funders whose agendas may differ.
The practical takeaway for journalists and media educators is clear: diversify funding, insist on transparent grant conditions that protect editorial autonomy and ground curricula in local realities so that skills transfer does not mean wholesale adoption of foreign professional models.
Donors should likewise design long-term, flexible funding that supports sustainability, not short-term project cycles that leave institutions exposed when geopolitics shifts.
It’s worth revisiting Professor Kwame Karikari’s 2002 work: “Where Has Aid Taken Africa? Re-Thinking Development” in which he wrote about the net benefits of aid for Africa’s development.
Another relevant question is this regard is contained in Dr Abena Yeboah’s 2018 paper in which she posed the question: “Is there a plausible case for particularising the content and structure of such training programmes towards an Afrocentric, development-journalism paradigm?”
Image by Pixabay via Pexels
This aricle was originally published by Ajen Newsletter.