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This article examines the use of citizen journalism for social mobilization in war-affected Tigray. A mixed approach was used, involving individual interviews, focus group discussions and a quantitative content analysis. The results revealed that citizen journalists provided information for community members to unite, support each other and make informed decisions. This was valuable for women and girls, as the allied forces used rape and hunger as weapons of war. Citizen journalists have inspired people to discuss war-related issues, enlightening capable individuals to join the Tigray Defence Forces. They travelled long distances to send videos and news reports to the Tigray Media House (TMH) and other news organizations abroad. The war coverage of TMH alerted the international community to undertake an independent investigation of genocide. This study contributes to our understanding of the role of citizen journalism during an information blackout, in which mobile phones were not alternative communication channels but the main sources of information.

This paper explores the factors constraining public service and commercial television channels in constituting the public sphere in Ethiopia. It focuses on three television stations and their respective programs, such as the Ethiopian Broadcasting Corporation's Ethiopian television (ETV)'s Medrek, Fana Broadcasting Corporation's Zuria Meles, and LTV's Sefiw Mehidar. The data was collected starting from 2019 to 2020 in Addis Ababa, the capital city of Ethiopia, where the three TV stations are located. These programs were designed to entertain different views, including ideologies, policies, and strategies to be deliberated and critiqued. They have created opportunities for debate and discussion as the Ethiopian media did not have new program formats for public deliberation-related shows previously. However, results showed that these platforms remained ineffective to entertain a diversity of views. One of the major challenges for this is that the production process encounters multiple obstructions from the media, the guests, and the government authorities. Guests fear to deliberate their views openly and prefer to remain abstinent. Also, the hosts lacked the courage, professionalism, and basic knowledge about the topics for discussion. Government authorities do not want the programs to be critical and deliberative. Equally, failures to achieve an inclusive public sphere are the outcomes of the unstable political landscape in the country. Therefore, due to different factors, including a highly controlled media landscape in Ethiopia, creating platforms for public debate seems unattainable.