"In the 1990s following the collapse of the Berlin Wall in Germany and the death of Apartheid in South Africa, several cross-national initiatives were undertaken in Africa to strengthen the role of the media in nascent democracies. Some 30 years later, several of these initiatives are dead while the surviving ones are on the brink of folding. This discussion takes a critical historic synopsis by exploring the conjectural and chronological foundations for such media initiatives, in particular, in the Southern African Development Community [MISA, SAMDEF and NSJ Centre]. It concludes that while much was accomplished, these foreign-inspired endeavours are no longer valid, useable or germane and ought to be abandoned. That way, Africa shall define its own urgencies, priorities and destiny without the external stimulus." (Abstract)