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2013 Budget Debates…Opposition slams unfair, “coordinated” attack by state media
Opposition Leader, Brigadier (ret’d) David Granger, on Wednesday night urged House Speaker, Raphael Trotman, to write President Donald Ramotar on the issue of the manner of coverage of the 2013 budget debates by the state-owned Government Information Agency (GINA).
Opposition Leader, David Granger
However, Government has refuted the allegations saying that the state’s television station, National Communications Network (NCN), has provided coverage of the debates which started on Tuesday.
The Speaker has since indicated that he will be talking to the editors of NCN.
However, the combined opposition of the Alliance For Change (AFC) and A Partnership For National Unity (APNU) are maintaining that it is not NCN alone that they are concerned about. According to Opposition MPs, they have also been monitoring the continued “biased” coverage from government-affiliated media entities including GINA, NCN, GuyMedia, Inewsgy.com, MTV News Update, TVG Channel 28, Guyana Times and the Guyana Chronicle.
In most cases, the Opposition MPs said, these media houses have been carrying the government side.
Government also has at its disposal several radio stations it issued to especially party’s members.
Last year during the 2012 National Budget deliberations, in protests of perceived biased coverage, the Opposition took away the subsidies of GINA and NCN.
However, using its interpretation of a court ruling, government restored the monies.
GINA has several reporters working who filed stories and these in turn are disseminated via email to media houses across the country. It is the content of these reports and the non-coverage that has Granger and the Opposition Members of Parliament (MPs) displeased and dissatisfied.
They believed the stance by the government-affiliated media houses is part of a coordinated effort to sideline them.
Speaking shortly before the end of debates Wednesday night, Granger said that the Opposition is “quite disturbed” by the reports filed by GINA on the first day.
Both Housing Minister Irfaan Ali and APNU’s Shadow Finance Minister Carl Greenidge made presentations on Tuesday. However, the Opposition said that while its MPs would have been covered, their presentations were only referred to in order to “criticize” or “denounce” particulars of their statements.
Granger made reference to coverage of the opposition by GINA last year and in a dossier, “The Executive War on the Legislative Branch”, listed 90 cases of biased reporting in favour of the government.
PPPC MP, Gail Teixeira
APNU in the dossier complained that GINA was causing tensions between Government and the Opposition.
On Wednesday evening, Granger said that the debates have national significance since it concerns the taxpayers’ monies and how it will be spent.
GINA’s coverage, he said, is a danger to democracy. “The government news agency has been playing a dangerous game of disinformation. I will not accept this level of reporting because it is depriving the people of this country…”
He urged the National Assembly to “seek a remedy to the travesty” and even called for a broadcasting mechanism to be established in order for the debates to be aired in their entirety.
He urged the Speaker to write President Ramotar, who is the Minister of Information, on the matter. If this cannot be done, MPs should then take more “decisive” actions, he said.
Chief Whip of the ruling People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C), Gail Teixeira, in refuting the Opposition Leader’s complaints, said that NCN Channel 11 carried the reports of Tuesday’s sessions. Cautioning the National Assembly not to jump and take a decision, Teixeira called for an analysis to be done first.
She also said that it is a fact that government has restrained itself from complaining about coverage from the privately-owned newspapers and websites.
The Speaker, in urging that the reporting standards be lifted, pointed out that it is a fact that debates are being streamed live on the internet and can be viewed in their entirety.
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