I marked the World Media Freedom Day on May 3 with special reference to a fruitful Pacific Islands News Association (PINA) meeting held in Fiji earlier this year and need for Fiji for its own home-grown Media model.
The previous PINA meeting in Fiji heralded a great future for a united media organisation in the Pacific.
When time is ripe, Pacific people have a lively debate, but there are occasions when they unite. This was one such, where the hitherto divided media persons in the Pacific buried their hatchets and emerged with a conciliatory approach, led by veteran Tongan publisher Kalafi Moala.
It was timely that other Pacific countries appreciated Fiji’s unique problems and why it was not buying wholesale the western concept of media freedom.
In light of Media Industry Development Decree 2010 and subsequent sale of The Fiji Times to Motibhai Group, I was pleasantly surprised when a Fiji reporter approached to confirm rumours I (a former publisher of Daily Post), was to be appointed publisher of the new Fiji Times.
I would have considered the position had I been approached by the concerned. This would have been appropriate as I had just completed research on the content analysis of Fiji Times, which revealed its partisan approach and its contribution to fall of the Mahendra Chaudhry government in May 2000.
Imperial tool
The newspaper was in Fiji a decade before the arrival of my forbears, the first Indian ‘coolies” in 1879.
Successive academics and writers have recorded heart-tearing atrocities against the defenceless, innocent and vulnerable indentured labourers. However, as a tool of colonisers, chiefs, elites and businesses, Fiji Times never saw any human rights breaches as reported by numerous others.
Generally, free media in civilised countries function as the last bastion of democracy. However, we have a unique and unprecedented case in Fiji where its oldest and most powerful newspaper remains accused of doing the opposite – contributing to political instability and fall of democracy.
As its home-grown and overseas-educated publisher, I would have been in a distinct position to exorcise its old ghosts and past evils.
A few weeks ago, I was again pleasantly surprised to be approached by a final year journalism student from the University of the South Pacific (USP), seeking my take on media freedom and the model suited for Fiji, in light of my research.
That made my day, as at least somebody in Fiji was interested in my research and the failings of unsuitable ‘western-style’ conflict journalism.
Spin Doctors
My research had shown that Fiji, as a Third World country, had media that was trying to emulate a First World press. As a multiracial country with a lopsided racial composition of media gatekeepers and newsrooms, Fiji was not ready for First World media freedom.
Since its independence in 1970 and notably after Sitiveni Rabuka’s coup in 1987, Fiji media failed to live to the expectations of a free media. Fiji media owners, editors and reporters failed to unite a racially -fragmented developing nation.
Bruce Hill (Radio Australia), who had attended the last PINA conference in Deuba (Fiji) was unpleasantly surprised to see he had no scrap to report on, and hence went on agenda-setting of discrediting the Association, ably supported by Dr Marc Edge, coordinator of the School of Journalism at USP.
Perhaps Dr Edge needs to take a lecture from Professor David Robie, Head of Pacific Media Centre at the AUT University in Auckland) and former Head of journalism at USP, on peace journalism, better understanding of press in the Pacific and non-suitability of western-style conflict journalism in Fiji. He also learnt how to utilise the potential capability of USP’s journalism school.
Dr Marc’s assertion that a form of development communication was not suitable for Fiji shows his lack of depth about underlying media problems in Fiji and the Pacific.
Development Journalism
Only after government’s controls did the media come on track, away from its habit of sensational divisive stories of racial conflicts.
Multiracial Fiji, rife with racial conflicts and political opportunism, needs a form of development journalism that reports on positive people stories that unite and not divide us.
Change is difficult to implement at newsroom levels, therefore it has to commence in journalism schools where budding journalists are exposed to issues in cross-cultural reporting. They are trained to appreciate the importance of widening the focus of journalism to the development role of journalists in a multicultural society.
They are taught to reflect sensitivity to cultural and political factors in reporting.
Interaction with people and reporting from their point of view and perspectives provides better understanding of community, their needs and aspirations.
My research showed how an irresponsible overseas-owned press failed in this respect, contributing to political instability in Fiji.
A new model
Fiji needs a home-grown model of media. History and research show that one-size-fits-all is not an option. Reporters have to feel part of the community where they change as well as bring change. They are not mere neutral observers who remain unmoved and unchanged by what they see and write. They are a medium of change through informing people. In other words, this model of journalism empowers people where assumption is that well informed citizens are well equipped to exercise their rights and duties as citizens in meaningful ways. Fiji media lacked this principle.
The Fiji model would require journalists to place greater emphasis on inculcating multiracialism rather than freedom of expression. In promoting fairness, justice and an understanding of cross-cultural relations, the journalist would indulge in self-censorship, and use their position to encourage and promote social and economic change that leads to a multicultural and developed society.
Thakur Ranjit Singh is a media commentator with masters in Communication Studies from AUT University, Auckland. He is former publisher of Fiji’s Daily Post newspaper and currently heads Media Relations Limited, a Public Relations, Event Management and Communications Company. E-mail: thakurji@xtra.co.nz
For his thesis, visit http://aut.researchgateway.ac.nz/handle/10292/2554]
