Media moguls, new media and ethics

The Melia Purosani Hotel ... venue for the AMIC 2013 media conference,
Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Photo: David Robie

IRONICALLY, while the major annual Asia-Pacific media research conference was unfolding in the Indonesian city of Yogyakarta - with a final day focused on "new ethics for old media" - the national press was highlighting corporate control by media moguls.

Election  organisers and Indonesia's broadcast commission have embarked on imposing tougher rules as media tycoons signal their plans to enter the presidential elections next year.

At the four-day 22nd Asian Media Information and Communication (AMIC) conference at Yogyakarta, University of Queensland head of journalism Dr Rhonda Breit, herself a qualified lawyer, criticised the ethical "invisibility" of large sections of the media.

She called on media schools to broaden journalism education and refocus on the "morality" of media, not just journalism as a profession.

Media Asia editor Dr Cherian George also called for a broader view of ethics, beyond professional codes, encompassing the responsibility of all citizens to treat journalism as a public good.

Global battle for images and ideas - challenging the West's 'news duopoly'

Professor Daya Thussu speaking at AMIC 2011. Middle: PNG's Joys Eggins. Bottom: PMC's Dr David Robie. Top two photos: David Robie; bottom image: Manawwar Naqvi

ONE of the highlights of last month’s AMIC conference in Hyderabad, India, was a presentation about the US/UK news “duopoly” and the distortions and “injustices of information flows”. Presented by professor Daya Thussu of Westminster University, a former editor of Gemini News Service - one of the post-war pioneers of “independent news” - it was a compelling session. Thussu regards the rise of Al Jazeera English as a critical factor in creating a “news contra flow” to challenge the Western prism. “It was important to have the independent perspective on the Libyan civil war provided by Al Jazeera,” he said. “There is a global battle for images and ideas and Al Jazeera is an important counter to the BBC/CNN global news duopoly."

Undoubtedly, foreign policy has been enormously affected by WikiLeaks – “the greatest leaks in history”, he argues. And the information guerrillas are playing an important role too, in spite of the celebrated “Gay girl in Damascus” blog being exposed as a hoax, and blogger Amina Arraf being unmasked as a man - 40-year-old American student activist Tom MacMaster.

The four-day 20th Asian Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC) conference, with more than 400 participants and presenters, was a stimulating event, even if understandably very heavily focused on the host nation India. The “Pacific” contingent may have been tiny (just four from Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea), but the team profiled well.

Associate professor Martin Hadlow of the University of Queensland and the Pacific’s representative at the UNESCO World Freedom Day event in New York in May, following his valiant efforts at getting last year’s UNESCO event staged in Brisbane last year, provided a global overview of development communication with a focus on the Pacific. He described how the Pacific, while being relatively underdeveloped in ICTs, had actually stolen a march over many developing countries with an innovative and rapid take up of mobile phones. He also talked about the region’s “heritage media” and radio was “still very much king” in the Pacific. He outlined the success of some new players like New Dawn FM in Bougainville, last year’s winners of a global communication and social change award sponsored by UOQ.

Papua New Guinea’s Joys Eggins, daughter of leading former EM TV journalist John Eggins and now doing her master’s degree at the University of Goroka, spoke about the Komunity Tok Piksa community video project in the Highlands. She outlined its success in producing visual messages on HIV/AIDS with local communities – “the dilemmas of collaboration, consent and ownership”.

Associate professor David Robie, director of the Pacific Media Centre, outlined contrasting media campus-based media models with case studies of both Wansolwara at the University of the South Pacific that now publishes this newspaper in partnership with the Fiji Sun, and Pacific Scoop, a partnership between AUT University and New Zealand’s largest independent digital news media group Scoop Media Ltd. The paper assessed their “publishing profiles and contrasts their independent brands focused on education, environmental issues – particularly climate change and deforestation – human rights, resource development, social justice, culture and language with mainstream media”.

Unitec’s Munawwar Naqvi’s paper presented a critical perspective on communication with communities within development efforts at the grassroots level in central India. Two models, selective interaction and new involvement, were developed from the data collected from semi-structured interviews of different types of non-governmental development organisations.

Next year’s AMIC conference will be in Malaysia and organisers already have the Malaysian Tourism Board lined up as one of the key sponsors. Café Pacific hopes to be represented.

• AMIC conference 2011
• Earlier post-AMIC and media freedom reports:
• Gang members kidnap, rape Indian journalist's niece
• Shooting of top Indian investigative journalist - and "Pacific" quartet photo

Shooting of top Indian investigative journalist shocks nation

WHILE a leading Indian politician was railing against media sensationalism and lack of credibility and a major Asian communications conference was meeting in Hyderabad this week, police in Mumbai were crowing over the arrest of seven alleged assassins of a prominent investigative journalist in a case that has shocked the nation.

Veteran MiDDay crime journalist Jyotirmoy Dey was gunned down in a street not far from his home on the outskirts of Mumbai in a daylight gangland style execution on June 11.

While police displayed the seven hooded suspects in a press conference after their arrest this week and showed off a .32 calibre American-made revolver and 20 rounds of “deadly and accurate” Czech-made extra long cartridges and five empty shells - which they claimed were used in the murder - no motive was revealed.

But the police claimed the journalist had been killed under a supari (contract killing) order by a notorious gangland leader, Chhota Rajan.

Six of the accused had criminal records, including the alleged gunman Satish Kalya, who is already facing three murder cases.

Welcoming the breakthrough by the police who were under tremendous pressure to crack the crime, the national newspaper The Hindu said in an editorial that the assassination had been meticulously planned over 20 days.

Investigations were still under way and the “3000 emails in Dey’s in-box have to be examined for crucial evidence”. The newspaper added:

Having caught the suspects, the police have an even bigger challenge – unravelling the motive behind the brazen killing. Most crime reporters have excellent contacts with the underworld and a network of informers. Dey did not speak to anyone of a threat to his life or demand protection.

News reports said the suspects, while confessing to the murder, claimed they did not know Dey was a prominent journalist.

Dey, 56, had been investigating and writing on the oil mafia in India, underworld links with policemen and other issues. Journalist groups were branding his murder as an assault on the Fourth Estate of democracy. He is the third Indian journalist to have been murdered so far in 2011.

Reporters sans frontières called for a full investigation to be carried out by a federal agency to ensure impartiality by investigators. But the Mumbai High Court has ruled that local police can continue their investigation until a July 6 deadline and to produce a report.

As Indian media splashed reports about the arrest of the suspects, CNN-IBN was reporting on a new clampdown on the media by politicians, including assaults in the state of Uttar Pradesh. Its reports were billed with the speculative headline: “Is the media the new enemy of politicians?”

Ironically, The Hindu reported the leaders of various parties calling on the media not to sensationalise news and to maintain credibility in shaping public opinion.

Speaking at the launch of Jagruti Television news channel in Hyderabad last Sunday, government whip Y. Sivarami Reddy criticised some media for promoting a handful of politicians and the “street rowdy” instead of reporting on people who were “changing society for good”.
Chairman of the state’s Economic Programme, N. Tulasi Reddy said media was the lifeline for survival of democracy. But he warned that as media organisations were increasing in India, their credibility was decreasing. He praised Jagruti channel for striving to promote a society with moral and ethical values instead of pandering to sensationalism.

Meanwhile, a four-day Asian Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC) organised annual conference on “the challenges and opportunities of globalisation, new media and the rise of Asia” featured five speakers from the Pacific among the more than 400 participants. The Pacific “delegation” was AMIC board member associate professor Martin Hadlow of Australia’s University of Queensland; Joys Eggins of the University of Goroka in Papua New Guinea; associate professor David Robie, director of New Zealand’s Pacific Media Centre; and Dr Munawwar Naqvi of Unitec in NZ.

Pictured: Top: The Hindu front page on June 28; left to right at AMIC 2011: Associate professor Martin Hadlow, Joys Eggins, associate professor David Robie and Dr Munawwar Naqvi.

• Mumbai High Court allows local police to continue investigation into reporter's murder

Up close and personal with a Subic tiger (or two)

After the angry rumblings over Anwar Ibrahim's sudden arrest in Malaysia over more trumped up politically-inspired allegations (a celebrated speaker at last year's AMIC in Singapore, he was freed before delegates had time to issue a protest) and sessions on regional abuse of media freedom, the conference wound down with a series of R & R visits outside Manila. I chose Subic Bay Freeport to check out the development given that 19 years ago I was a journalist covering the international Peace Brigade protests about US presence at Subic and at the Clark Air Base. It's certainly an extraordinary and controversial attempt to turn a military base through "volunteerism"into a tax and duty free zone like Hongkong or Singapore. Former colonial power Spain established an arsenal and ship-repair facility at Subic Bay in 1885. But the US took over after the Spanish-American War and turned Subic Bay into a US Navy and Marine base. It was critically important during the Vietnam War as the base of the Seventh Fleet. After protacted protests after the ousting of Marcos, the Philippine Senate finally rejected US terms for extending the lease of the base. Sadly, the memorial outside the SDF headquarters honouring the 12 senators who were key to giving the US the boot from the base has been poorly maintained. Four of the plaques have vanished altogether. The last US warship, USS Belleau Wood, slipped out of Subic Bay on November 24, 1992. Most interesting for my visit was the nature and marine parks that have been created. A minor drama for our small AMIC group was feeding a couple of aggressive tigers in the "tiger safari" park. We were well-protected, of course. Instead of humans visiting the zoo, it was more like tigers being up close and personal with humans inside caged vehicles.
Pictured include Pacific Media Centre director David Robie, Angie Chew of AMIC (rear) and Zulkarimein Nasution of Universitas Indonesia (right).

• AMIC - Asian Media Information and Communication Centre
• AMIC Alternative Media Portal
• Zoobic safari
• Pinoy Press - media freedom in the Philippines
• AMIC 2008 images
• Philippines in pictures

Journo killing 'intolerable violation' in Philippines

While UNESCO has condemned the murder of Filipino journalist Robert Sison and called on Philippines authorities to protect media workers, more than 500 people from Asia and the Pacific have gathered in Manila for a major regional media conference. UNESCO director-general Kochiro Matsuura said the targeting of journalists was an 'intolerable violation' of freedom of expression. Sison, 60, was the second journalist killed in the Philippines this year and the 56th since 2001. Meanwhile, the vice-president and a former president of the Philippines have been keynote speakers at this 17th Asian Media, Information and Communication Centre (AMIC) conference at the historic Manila Hotel. Vice-President Noli "Kanayan" De Castro, once a broadcaster himself, urged the media to remind people, governments and institutions that compassion and generosity are needed to fight the forces of poverty and injustice. The media needs to keep shaking governments out of their complacency. Former President Fidel Ramos appealed to communication students and journalists, calling for "sharing, caring and daring" from the media in dealing with the Millenium Development Goals. A new Pacific media book, South Pacific Island Communications: Regional Perspectives, Local Issues, co-published by AMIC, AUT University's Pacific Media Centre and the University of the South Pacific, was one of six publications launched at the conference. An interesting chapter by Robert Iroga, former editor of the Solomon Star, with some interesting insights when you work at a newspaper with threatening gunmen in your face.
On Wednesday, Sarah Baker and Jeanie Benson presented a stimulating paper, "The suitcase, the samurai and the pumpkin," about Asian crime and how it is framed by NZ media.

• AMIC's revamped website - six new media books
• Pacific Media Centre

Bland and descriptive - and free speech?

A Singapore clarification from Alan Knight, the Oz board member of AMIC:
"I recall saying from the podium in Singapore, I thought the WJEC declaration was bland and descriptive. I also wondered why there was no reference to freedom of speech or the Declaration of Human Rights.
"Just for the record, the journalism education declaration was formulated by the WJEC which is a completely separate organisation from AMIC which in this case merely hosted the conference."
Just to add my few words, I tend to dismiss the recent negatives about "development journalism" - it is often misunderstood by western journos, particularly from Oz and NZ (most NZ j-schools cover little about news values outside the Kiwi environment). Vigorous development journalism as often practised in the Philippines and the Pacific, for example, uncovers corruption, is committed to media freedom and demands accountability - and usually requires a level of personal courage from journalists rarely needed in western media environments.
Alan noted the closing day speech by Anwar Ibrahim - this was inspired, even brilliant. It was worth being at this conference to hear him! Certainly he was one of the highlights for me.

More on the Singapore 'models'

Check out Digital Learning for the UNESCO booklet launch at AMIC and Guy Berger's Conversant blog and WJEC for the other "models".

The Singapore declarations - and the risks

One of the highlights for me at the AMIC conference in Singapore last month - where I gave a paper offering a critique of international media aid in the Pacific and was reelected as the NZ country rep - was a visit to Nanyang Technological University (pictured), which has one of the best communication studies and journalism programmes in Asia (Wee Kim Wee).

A United Nations "Model Curricula for Journalism Education for Developing Countries and Emerging Democracies" booklet was launched at AMIC and various syndicates of the parallel World Journalism Education Congress (WJEC) had their own crack at producing "models" . Guy Berger at Rhodes University in SA posted a good rundown on discussion on his Conversant blog. But on the JEAnet, John Herbert noted a warning:

"I hope this WJEC thing doesn't over take the domestic JEA agenda and meetings etc...one thing that Singapore told me was that the universality of journalism and journalism education is a bit of a pipe dream, and extremely dangerous, and could easily lead to the imposition by the strongest on the rest, colluding with globalism and journalistic imperialism at the expense of localised journalism and journalism education fit for local purpose rather than adhering to some kind of universal ( inevitably Western) approach....we need to keep focused on the internal Australia problems, which are very important ones to solve at the moment, particularly the RQF matter which needs the biggest guns in the university journalism schools to be involved, the professors and senior highly thought of journalism educators need to be at the spearhead of this discussion...."