Dear Editor,
After the state withdrew ads from your newspaper, a cross-section of persons express-ed public disapproval of the action. But since your newspaper was the object of the state’s action, it was up to you to keep the matter in people’s focus, by posting on your newspapers’ Internet version a daily reminder of the need for the state to restore the ads, until a final resolution was satisfactorily achieved.
Unfortunately, Mr CN Sharma and Mr Gordon Moseley may not have the same kind of everyday public access at their disposal to keep reminding their target audience of the grave injustice meted out to them by the Office of the President. And since those actions here have revealed an intention to punish the free media for not playing the government’s game, then what has been done to Messrs Sharma and Moseley, can easily be done to any media house or media operative. Nothing has to be proved; the Office of the President just has to say it is displeased and the axe falls. It’s almost like it is the embodiment of the laws and standards. It comes across as arbitrary, erratic and dictatorial, but that’s the reality to be dealt with.
But all this bizarre behaviour is telling us is that independent media houses and operatives must stand up to this attempt at muzzling them by continually reporting the news, even when the President thinks the stories are too negative. This, by the way, is where his actual grouse with the independent media lies: negative stories.
Little does the President know that what he perceives as ‘negative news’ the public sees as ‘necessary news.’ With no Freedom of Information law to legally empower media houses to authenticate government press releases and briefings by going to its departments and agencies for physical documents to peruse, the government is able to determine what it wants the public to know while hiding certain information in order to protect its image and its decision-makers. This is government’s way of obtaining a positive image when its releases and briefings are reported as presented and unquestioned. If it’s a government-related story and government is not the source, that’s a basis for negative news.
However, when standard investigative journalism is employed to produce in-depth news stories, or when ‘inside sources’ that wish to remain anonymous leak information that government wants ducked from the public, this is what the government considers negative news reporting.
A comparative analysis of the three major dailies in Guyana will reveal that only the state-run Chronicle deliberately abstains from reporting certain news stories that spotlight the failures and errors of the government. This behaviour does not build confidence and trust in the public when they have to read about such government errors and failures in the independent dailies.
And since governments in developed democracies usually depend on the independent media to help win the public’s trust and confidence for domestic and foreign policy issues by allowing them to report the positive and the negative developments in those countries, the onus is on independent media houses to build and establish a relationship with their target audience based on reporting the news truthfully, fearlessly and in-depth.
Winning readers, listeners and viewers is a process that takes lots of time and lots of hard work in media houses. Attention to detail and accuracy is paramount. That is why when the President criticizes the independent media houses for producing ‘negatives news,’ he is basically disrespecting, disparaging and reproaching the work ethic of media operatives. Now, how can he expect to disrespect a whole sector this way but gets ravingly ballistic when he conveniently wants to feel he is disrespected by that sector? “Do so nuh like so,” is a local proverb that aptly describes this behaviour.
Mr Editor, in Guyana today, I believe the public have more confidence in the independent media houses than they have in the government’s spokespersons and the state-run media outlets to bring them the news. It’s a terrible indictment against the authorities when they can’t be trusted with information.
That is why when the Office of the President banned Mr Moseley and the President suspended Mr Sharma’s station, and his official mouthpieces and letter-writing apologists go to bat for his defence, they all fail to realize they’re battling against public opinion. They are the minority when it comes to winning public approval and support, but since self-deception is the worst form of deception, then they may be the last to know this truth.
Yours faithfully,
Emile Mervin
