12:03 PM |
May 3, 2010
COOK ISLANDS NEWS WORLD PRESS FREEDOM DAY EDITORIAL:
It's still a fragile freedom
Freedom of expression is a civil liberty we mostly take for granted in this country.
We see and hear that freedom working itself out in everyday life – letters to the editor, talkback radio, the ongoing Sunday flight protests in Aitutaki – and we consider it normal.
But by comparison with our Pacific neighbours, some of whom struggle against censorship and oppression, we are privileged people.
We should all celebrate this today, as we mark World Press Freedom Day.
Certainly Cook Islands News does.
Of course freedom of expression is a Constitutional right of citizenship in the Cook Islands, and we rightly pride ourselves on it – as part of being an enlightened democratic state.
But today as we focus on press or media freedom, we also take stock of a few of the challenges and threats to that 'freedom'.
Indeed, when we look at Helen Greig's account of wrongful arrest and police intimidation as a result of doing her job, there also is a disturbing side to reporting of the truth in this peaceful nation.
Helen was arrested, interrogated (for three hours) and charged with trespassing after she took pictures to prove that a vehicle paid for by a Chinese construction company had fallen into the hands of a government agency employee.
The charges against her have since been dropped for the want of a prosecution case, and we have been promised a public apology by police (though the apology and retraction still have not arrived).
Something sinister went on behind the scenes, as men of influence commanded her harassment, following through on their prior threats to 'get her'. That in itself is disquieting.
Our open reporting of opinions on contentious issues draws scorn on an almost daily basis, and legal threats on a weekly basis. It's routine stuff. Mostly we shun them on the basis of the public's right to know. We are fighting several defamation cases in the courts, as part of what it takes to do our job.
On the positive side, we take heart from the fact that we have the only freedom of information law in a Pacific islands country. Our politicians revelled in it when they passed the law, even though it is still handicapped by lack of resources for education, and is still not really effective.
Despite our Official Information Act, the Cook Islands is being denied its right to know at the highest level.
The most powerful entity of government, Cabinet, is still a stronghold of secrecy and non-disclosure. We believe, and argue, that the public has every right to know what Cabinet decides, what deals it does and what funds it spends.
For the past five years we have pleaded for weekly cabinet media briefings, and for release of cabinet minutes and documents, but we are continually denied information. Nowadays we rely on leaks (when it suits an individual) and on papers falling off the back of a truck. We gladly use this information, but it gets us offside with the power-brokers and is not good for healthy relationships.
We have produced examples of weekly public statements from the cabinets of New Zealand and Samoa, recommending that our cabinet follows suit.
Our Prime Minister and Cabinet Services use the lame excuse of a rule that four days must pass to allow cabinet decisions to be notified to affected parties.
Hopefully they will realise the error of this way, especially if they take seriously last week's potent comment by Jacqui Evans, a former journalist whose Masters thesis deals with the 'Sheraton' hotel debacle.
Evans believes the $81 million Sheraton scandal was much worse than the current Toagate financial blunder, and concluded: "Personally, I think that if we fostered a culture of transparency so that free and immediate online access to cabinet minutes was normal practice, the opportunity would be given for public input and healthy debate so that we don't find ourselves in this fix again."
It's true that both the Sheraton and Toagate deals were done in the secrecy of Cabinet meetings, with deliberate intent to deny the public of the right to know – and this is wrong morally and democratically.
Yes we may enjoy freedom of expression and we may have a largely free press, but it is a fragile freedom that needs protection and promotion.
John Woods
Managing Editor
Cook Islands News
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pacific islands media association
pima.nius@gmail.com
aotearoa, new zealand
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