11:42 AM |
Claims Fiji govt censorship affecting work of PINA
Updated
A senior member of the Pacific's peak media body, the Pacific Islands News Association (PINA), has called for major changes in how the Suva-based organisation is run. PINA's Vice-President, John Woods, who's also editor of the Cook Islands News, has highlighted serious internal issues saying he's been isolated by PINA's executive for demanding to see its accounts. He has also called for the organisation to be re-located outside of Fiji and away from censorship of its military authorities, which he says is preventing the body from doing it's job.
Presenter: Clare Arthurs
Speaker: John Woods, Vice President, Pacific Islands News Association (PINA) and Editor and Publisher, Cook Island News
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WOODS: I have decided as vice-president [that] I'm so frustrated by the inaction and inefficiency of our organisation, and I mean at the administrative level and from the President down, that I'm publishing this Easter a memo to members, past members and future members setting out the position, the problems within PINA, the lost opportunities that are going by and the strong threat we have that the whole organisation will just collapse.
ARTHURS: Have you reported your concerns to the donors who provide so much of your funding, and I'm thinking of AusAid and the EU among others?
WOODS: I've spoken with them, I haven't really enunciated this in writing. I know they share the concerns. Many of them are patiently waiting and hoping that PINA will come right.
ARTHURS: Are you saying it's inefficiency and wastage, or corruption in the organisation?
WOODS: It could be both and I'm open to challenge on that but I'm also open to disclosure from our board, from the secretariat, of anything they may know [that] I don't.
ARTHURS: Have you raised your concerns with the President and the other administrative staff?
WOODS: Absolutely, I'm now tarred with the brush of being negative and destructive. The General Manager refused at first to even deal with me, said that I had some kind of ulterior motive to bring down the office, which is untrue. I just want some efficiency, some 21st century business practices to be followed. My main concern at the December meeting, we go all that way, funded by AusAid and others, to meet in Fiji, that's a board of six people, and we've no financial reports. I've still not seen one piece of paper with any figures to do with bank balances, expenditure, revenue from membership, revenue from subscriptions to PACNEWS, I can't even get the basics. And I am highly frustrated to the point I think we're in dire straits. The office needs to be suspended or put in abeyance.
ARTHURS: Have you threatened to resign?
WOODS: I have not threatened to resign. I was elected with the goodwill of those who were in Vanuatu on a ticket I suppose of reform, of the need for restructuring, and I'm here to see it through.
ARTHURS: How much do you think that the root of the problems that you're outlining as you see them is because PINA is based in Fiji, which is under a military rule?
WOODS: Now this figures largely and bigger than ever before. You see, anything that might be inflammatory, anything that might disturb the regime or the censors, never seems to get the light of the day, doesn't even make the form of a memo.
ARTHURS: Do you think it's time Mr Woods, for PINA to move out of Suva?
WOODS: I do, I've come to that decision in recent weeks because of this ineffectual relationship that I have as vice president, and if I'm to do my job I need openness and transparency within the office. We don't get that. It's always as if everything is being hidden or covered up. I can't bear that any longer. I feel that influence of the censors and the kowtowering to the censors by PINA or the administration and our President is contrary to what we stand for, which is freedom of expression, open and robust media. The Fiji military is interfering with freedoms of expression, it's throttling the media in Fiji. Here we have a media decree coming up where they're going to prevent foreign ownership. Where and when was that ever an issue? Where and when was that ever presented to the media for discussion? It's also basically a dictatorship, and we have to move out from under its influence.
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pacific islands media association
pima.nius@gmail.com
aotearoa, new zealand
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