Govt. should stop minding the media

On Tuesday night the print media fraternity in Sri Lanka marked the 25th anniversary of the Journalism Awards for Excellence, the annual event organised by The Editors’ Guild of Sri Lanka in partnership with the Sri Lanka Press Institute and its affiliated unions; the Newspaper Society of Sri Lanka, the Free Media Movement and the Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association.

It is a night when the spotlight turns fleetingly on those who work courageously and passionately behind the scenes of the print media. Coincidentally yesterday marked the 16th death anniversary of Lasantha Wickrematunge, one such courageous journalist who paid the ultimate price for exposing corruption among the politically powerful in the country.

Since the National People’s Power (NPP) Government came to power, there have been veiled threats against the media by some of its ministers while there appears to be a subtle attempt to deny the media access to information by putting gag orders preventing both members of the Government and officials from talking to the media. 

While journalists do depend on officials’ spokespersons to clarify news, they largely depend on sources in Government or other sectors to get their news but access to ministers, and others in top positions in this Government is becoming difficult. Most ministers, some of whom were falling over each other once to get their articles published in newspapers and make appearances on television shows, have suddenly fallen off the radar and it has become near impossible to contact them.

There is also the Right to Information (RTI) which journalists among members of the public use to access certain kinds of information including from the President’s Office. An email to the RTI office at the PO would usually be attended to promptly but the RTI page, since the new President assumed office has gone blank with a message saying, ‘coming soon.’ Government web portals need to be updated no doubt but when they were properly functioning sites, it is baffling why the RTI options are not working now.

Then we have had several ministers including Cabinet Spokesman Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa who has expressed the Government’s displeasure at some sections of the media and warning that if the available laws are not adequate, new laws will have to be introduced to deal with ‘agenda driven’ media.

Another of his ministerial colleagues, Minister Bimal Ratnayake recently went as far as to suggest that the Sri Lanka media should consider reform as part of the Government’s ‘Clean Sri Lanka’ initiative.

“The people’s mandate requests us to clean up, and we will do it. It would be good if the media cleans up as well. Just because the media says something, we will not stop our work,” he said at a public event.

There are problems with the Sri Lanka media like there are problems with the media all over the world, but politicians are not the best placed to tell media personnel how they should behave. The condescending attitude of the Government does not help its relations with the media. No media organisation is bound to pussyfoot around a government. The role of the media is to hold those in power to account and be the voice of the voiceless. What gets highlighted in the media is not to please a particular politician or a political party and if anyone expects the media to be that way, it will not happen.

It takes political maturity to understand that every story that is written, telecast or broadcast in the media is not part of a conspiracy against the Government in power. The Government needs to focus on its election pledges and work toward fulfilling them instead of its unhealthy attempt to mind the media.