{"id":52102,"date":"2019-11-25T06:00:57","date_gmt":"2019-11-24T19:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=52102"},"modified":"2019-11-24T07:10:16","modified_gmt":"2019-11-23T20:10:16","slug":"the-pressures-on-south-pacific-journalism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/the-pressures-on-south-pacific-journalism\/","title":{"rendered":"The pressures on South Pacific journalism"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n

Journalism has always been a tough trade in the South Pacific. Living and working in island communities exposes editors and reporters to unusual political, personal and professional pressures.<\/p>\n

A statement warning about \u2018growing threats to media freedom\u2019<\/a> from the Melanesia Media Freedom Forum<\/a>, representing journalists from Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and West Papua, has been underlined by Vanuatu\u2019s expulsion<\/a> of a long-serving editor.<\/p>\n

Kiribati chucking out a visiting Australian TV crew also says something about media problems.<\/p>\n

One change these days is that Pacific journalists can\u2019t rely as they once could on the coverage and support of Australian media and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.<\/p>\n

An irony of Australia\u2019s policy \u2018step-up\u2019<\/a> in the South Pacific is how much Oz media has stepped down. As the ABC marks the 80th birthday of its international service, Radio Australia, a celebration footnote is that it seems Australia\u2019s mothballed shortwave-radio site is in the process of being sold.<\/p>\n

The Vanuatu story illustrates the forces confronting Pacific journalists. In a \u2018dark day for media freedom\u2019<\/a>, the media director and publisher of Vanuatu\u2019s Daily Post<\/em>, Dan McGarry, had to leave the country where he\u2019s lived for 16 years. As McGarry writes, \u2018I believe the\u00a0government refused my application\u00a0to renew my work visa to silence me and warn other journalists in the country not to speak out.\u2019<\/p>\n

Like much else in the South Pacific, there\u2019s a China dimension. McGarry says the prime minister\u2019s office warned him about \u2018negative\u2019 coverage in July: <\/em><\/p>\n

The Daily Post<\/em> had just published a series of articles relating to how the government had detained six Chinese nationals\u2014four of whom had Vanuatu citizenship\u2014without trial or access to legal counsel. They were stripped of their citizenship and placed on a plane to China. We don\u2019t know what happened to them after that \u2026<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no evidence to suggest that China has asked for or even wanted my removal. But it seems clear that political pressures exerted on senior bureaucrats have resulted in this attempt to stifle the media.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Kiribati detaining and expelling the Channel 9\u2019s TV crew certainly added drama to the \u2018trouble in paradise\u2019<\/a> story on 60 Minutes<\/em>, and played to its report about \u2018sinister\u2019 Chinese activities. Watching the segment, though, it seemed more the usual island play of political personalities and power, with extra pressure stirred in by Kiribati\u2019s switch of diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China.<\/p>\n

Vanuatu and Kiribati join Papua New Guinea and Fiji on the dishonor roll of island governments that have expelled journos. In heaving hacks, governments always talk tough about asserting sovereignty, but it\u2019s always a bad look. Why so sensitive? What\u2019s to hide? This assertion of power makes a government look weak, not strong.<\/p>\n

As Jemima Garrett<\/a> writes, there\u2019s no doubt that, for Australia, China\u2019s growing influence is the story of the decade. But, with so few Australian journalists based in the region, even significant developments in the China story are going unreported:<\/p>\n

The level of understanding and knowledge in Australia about the Pacific is staggeringly low. While there has been a significant uptick in Australian media interest in the region recently, its almost single-minded focus on China is not helping improve that understanding and is aggravating Pacific leaders who want to see Pacific voices and a wider agenda make more of an impact in Australia.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Melanesia media statement said the \u2018global decline of democracy is making it easier for our governments to silence the media\u2019; misinformation, propaganda and fake news are growing problems; and social media is an \u2018existential threat\u2019, undermining the budget and role of Melanesian media companies.<\/p>\n

The forum called for a better understanding of the role of journalism in the functioning and accountability of Melanesian democracies:<\/p>\n

The range of threats to media freedom is increasing. These include restrictive legislation, intimidation, political threats, legal threats and prosecutions, assaults and police and military brutality, illegal detention, online abuse, racism between ethnic groups and the ever-present threats facing particularly younger and female reporters who may face violence both on the job and within their own homes.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Since the ABC closed its shortwave service<\/a> in January 2017, half of the Pacific Islands Forum countries now hear nothing from Radio Australia.<\/p>\n

Killing shortwave disenfranchised an unknown number of listeners. As broadcasting policy, it was highly questionable. As strategy, it was dumb\u2014a distressing example of Oz amnesia about its South Pacific role and the role of free media in the islands<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The quietly released report of the review of Australia\u2019s media reach in the Asia\u2013Pacific<\/a> didn\u2019t advocate restoring shortwave, but nor did it endorse ABC dumbness. The recommendation was to think harder: Australia must identify its \u2018strategic policy objectives\u2019<\/a> and clarify the role of broadcasting.<\/p>\n

Geoff Heriot<\/a> is properly scathing about the review\u2019s fuzzy geographic frame, and the way it calculates the benefits of shortwave only in economic terms.<\/p>\n

Yet even on the money, the report found that in the decade before closure, Australia had \u2018derived $40.3 million of net benefits from its shortwave broadcasts to the Asia Pacific region\u2019.<\/p>\n

So, ending shortwave hurt the national pocket as well as foreign policy.<\/p>\n

As Australia ponders its interests, influence and values in the South Pacific, it must look anew at the central role of media.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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