The truth will set us all free

Mar 20, 2025 Editorial, News

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Editorial…

Kaieteur News- The issues of access to information and press freedom are constantly being debated in our media these days. Yesterday, in our editorial, we pointed out the difficulties that citizens encounter in trying to obtain access to information in Guyana and how challenging it is to get information from the Guyana Government, using the statutory provision of the Office of the Commissioner of Information.

We have seen, also, a recent report by CIVICUS Monitor– a global alliance of civil society organisations and activists, which has warned about the deteriorating press freedom situation in Guyana and cited Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo’s weekly press conference, that are geared at criticising dissenting voices, and President Irfaan Ali’s penchant for hiding behind controlled media interactions and Facebook lives.

The report, released on March 1, 2025, raised concerns over the administration’s approach to media engagement. The organisation further noted that Guyana’s position on the Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom Index has declined dramatically, and noted that while physical attacks on journalists are rare, they face substantial cyberbullying and efforts to discredit their work. The organisation also pointed out that the government has downplayed the significance of the index’s decline, by offering public relations positions to journalists and selectively distributing state advertisement funds to media houses and social media commentators aligned with its views.

It is well-known that the PPP/C Government likes to control the narrative, shutting out persons with dissenting views and even attacking them. History bears the facts of such behaviour and, as elections draw near, we have seen that trend intensifying. This newspaper has constantly been at the receiving end of the government’s attacks- many times because we dare to ask questions or challenge the status quo, or refuse to go along with the narrative the government wants. It has been said that genuine news is something somebody somewhere doesn’t want you to know and everything else is just PR. In our reporting of the news over the decades that we have been in existence, we have come to appreciate the truth of that aphorism. There is hardly a day that goes by when we do not receive a call or an email from some individual or organisation, complaining about a report of ours- sometimes for good reasons- but most of the time, because they did not like the focus of the article. But, as a newspaper, we hold it as our sacred duty, in the common parlance, to “call it as we see it.”

We have always known that, by taking this approach, and refusing to be a PR vehicle for any entrenched interest, there were risks involved – from governments, political parties, corporations or assorted “shady characters.” We are not saying that Guyana does not have freedom of the press. If this were not so, then we would not see the lampooning and skewering of some of the “big ones”. But what we detect is a gradual tightening of the screws in insidious ways against those who insist on maintaining an independent viewpoint. And this is a very slippery slope. A former President of ours, who knew a thing or two about muzzling the press, once famously remarked that there are many ways to skin a cat, and he graphically went on to illustrate the gravamen of his remark: you can give it mange; you can wring its neck, or you could skin it, etc.

Today, the abuse of administrative procedures is deployed to harass those who hold a different viewpoint than the powers that be. We are also witnessing the creation and support of new media outlets aligned to the government, to guarantee that only PR brochures will be transmitted to the people- coupled with the harassment of other media outlets. We want to remind those who appear to have forgotten, that the free press was born as part and parcel of the modern flowering of democracy. From all the evidence, it does not appear that the latter can take root and survive without the former. Power, and its inevitable corrupting effect on those who are voted into office, demands that the people, in whose hands ultimate sovereignty lie, must be given adequate information to make informed decisions. This is what will make those decisions “democratic”.

In 1993, the United Nations gave recognition to the pivotal role of a free press, in the sustenance of good governance, by declaring every May 3 as “World Press Freedom Day”. It is in that same month that we also celebrate our independence from the yoke of foreign rule. But if our people are denied the multiplicity of views that is the hallmark of a vibrant democracy, then we are dooming them to a more invidious yoke of oppression from the vacuum of information that would stifle their minds. We understand that with all freedoms, including freedom of the press, come responsibility; freedom of the press does not mean license. There are laws on the books to prosecute those who violate that freedom. If there is anything that we have printed that is not factual, then we ask those who are affected, to bring this to our attention and we will offer our apology or face the legal consequences. Otherwise, let us do our duty to inform the people. It is the truth that will set us all free.

(The truth will set us all free)

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• CIVICUS Monitor-, Editorial, media, Press Freedom

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