Misinformation on media harassment

Jul 22, 2008 Letters

DEAR EDITOR,
We need to respond to Derek Sampson’s misinformed letter in SN of July 17, 2008. Sampson presents a case of media harassment by the Guyana Government, and cites these cases: withdrawal of advertisements from SN; the ‘April 2008’ suspension of CNS 6TV; and now the declaration of Gordon Moseley as persona non grata.

Stabroek News’s limited circulation and limited reach drove the Government Information Agency (GINA) to withdraw the placement of advertisements from that newspaper.

GINA’s policy on the placement of advertisements is as follows: place newspaper advertisements in the state media plus one private media house.

And so, in order to comply with the policy of placing advertisements in only one private newspaper, GINA made a business decision to focus its commercials mainly towards the Kaieteur News, certainly not a pro-Government newspaper.

The Guyana Chronicle is the state’s newspaper, not a private newspaper. GINA’s policy decision complied with economic factors.

And this kind of competition and the free market should further refine press freedom; at least, so say the advocates of capitalism.

The April 2008 suspension of CNS 6 from transmitting and the ensuing enforcement of that suspension was due to its non-compliance with the terms and conditions of the National Frequency Management Unit’s (NFMU) licensing conditions.

The suspension once again brought into play intentional confusion between freedom of speech and compliance with licensing conditions.

The CNSTV 4-month suspension issue attracted wide publicity and titillated the imaginations of the Opposition forces and others.

Any threat to kill any President of any country is more than serious; and a caller on the CNSTV ‘Voice of the People’ made such a threat.

The broadcaster on CNSTV acknowledged the difficulty presented by this caller; and so CNSTV, through this broadcast, violated the conditions of the licence as well as the law.

Yet CNSTV effected three unedited rebroadcasts of this programme; the television station had sufficient time to edit out the ‘threat,’ but failed to take corrective action. Now, let’s move to the issue of the persona non grata status of Mr. Gordon Moseley.

Mr. Moseley acquired persona non grata status at the Office of the President (OP) and State House as a direct result of reproachful and disrespectful comments on the Head of State in his letter to the press.

He can continue to cover the President, but at events outside of the premises of OP and State House.

Indeed, Mr. Moseley already recently covered the President at the CARIFESTA Secretariat. Freedom of the press is not absolute, and so there must be boundaries and limitations.

There must be professionalism and a journalist’s code of conduct that is alien to Denis Chabrol of the Guyana Press Association.
Prem Misir

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