Seven commissioners were yesterday elected to head the Rwanda Media Commission (RMC), the media self-regulatory body.

The RMC is a peer mechanism mandated to regulate the media. They receive and address media related complaints. The commission acts as the primary and highest arbitrator of complaints against the media based on professional journalism code of ethics.

Four of the commissioners elected are journalists while the three others were drawn for the academia, civil society and the Rwanda Bar Association.

Close to 300 journalists participated in the elections.

Veteran broadcast journalist Cleophas Barore was elected the new chairperson after beating tight competition.

Other commissioners from the media include Edmund Kagire, Jerome Rwasa and Lilian Uwineza.

Others elected are: Immaculee Ingabire from Transparency International, Jean Pierre Uwimana a journalism instructor and Donatien Mucyo, a lawyer.

Before the elections, Barore, who has been at the helm of the institution in an acting position since May last year told reporters that since its inception in 2013, RMC has registered some progress but also faces various challenges.

"One of our responsibilities is to receive complaints from the public about journalists and since this office opened, we have received and solved over 160 complaints. Of these, 104 were from the public while 44 were from journalists. Some of these complaints were even from the Diaspora,” Barore said.

The new board has a mandate of three years with the next election scheduled for 2020.

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