What news is fit to print?

Sep 02, 2009 Editorial

The President, before a most august gathering of our top business organisation – the Private Sector Commission – accused this newspaper of harming the image of the country by publishing news about murders and other “fabricated” gory stories on its front pages. To hold the businessmen’s attention, he waxed eloquent about the putative negative effect on the tourism trade – and on businessmen’s pockets – by such news being highlighted. He blamed the businessmen for contributing to the “negativity” because they advertise with Kaieteur News.
Several fundamental issues are raised. First and foremost there is the issue of what news our paper ought to carry and what weight – implied by our page-placement – we ought to give news that might reflect “negatively” on the country. Even though the President later said that he believes in a “free press”, we can only conclude, in the context of the ongoing extended colloquy between his information chief and this newspaper about our news coverage, that he is attempting to introduce censorship over the news.
It is an old ploy of those in power, who fear the exposure of their non-performance or malfeasance to the public that has placed them in their positions of authority, to raise the issue of patriotism: printing particular bits of news will harm the country.
There are obviously instances when publication of some news will harm the national security – we can think immediately of troop movements during wartime, for instance. But is news about crime in our circumstance, an analogous threat to our tourism industry?
We do not believe that it is. The government’s own figures, which boast that arrivals in this country have been on the rise in recent years, belie the President’s assertion. What we do know, through several studies commissioned by the IMF and World Bank, is that political instability is the greatest deterrent to increased direct foreign investment in our country.
The government has direct responsibility for dealing with political instability and its performance in this regard has definitely been less than stellar. News about crime is just a red herring that the President is dragging across the trail of guilt on its failure to attract investment into this country.
The second issue has class overtones that hark back to an older, elitist notion of what news was important enough to deserve “front-page” treatment. It used to be that only the “big” and “important” personalities could fit the bill. No one would protest if, for instance, the murder or death by accident of a Minister, were given front-page reporting.
We are idealistic enough to believe that all lives are just as important – and we proudly – and deliberately – try not to banish news about the life and death of the “little” ones in our society to the “inside” pages. We shall not be moved.
Last, but not least, there is the President’s not so veiled threat against our existence by linking the advertising businessmen place in this newspaper with support of our alleged creation of a negative image for our country. Let us call a spade a spade. The environment for private business in this country is still an extremely emaciated one: not least on account of the aforesaid refusal or inability of the government to resolve the existential political instability.
In this climate, businesses are extremely dependent on the state for a large chunk of their revenues. Even those businesses that do not deal directly with the state are regulated and taxed by it. And in this country, we all know that as another President (Burnham) pointed out, “There are many ways to skin a cat.”
We would like to assure all Guyanese, and indeed all those that have Guyana’s well-being at heart – including the foreign community – that Kaieteur News will continue to print all the news that is fit to print and print it where we see fit. We expect that the wrath of those from on high will descend on us; but with your support, we shall overcome.

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What news is fit to print?

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