Former President Bharrat Jagdeo has said that his PPP/C administration “was wrong” to withdraw state advertising from Stabroek News in 2006.
Almost 13 years after a 17-month boycott of this newspaper which began in November 2006, Jagdeo told his weekly press conference that “in retrospect it may be the wrong decision.” This is the first time Jagdeo or anyone in his administration has said the 2006 boycott was wrong.
In response to questions about whether his past actions made him ethically unfit to criticize the current administration’s use of state media, Jagdeo repeated the defence that government in 2006 chose to advertise only in the private newspaper which “had the highest circulation”