12:22 PM |
Title – 6843 REGION: Samoa not so free, says Samoa Observer publisher
Date – 5 May 2010
Byline – Thakur Ranjit Singh
Origin – Pacific Media Watch
Source – Pacific Scoop, 5/5/10
Copyright – PS
Status – Unabridged
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SAMOA IS NOT FREE, OBSERVES EDITOR-IN-CHIEF OF SAMOA OBSERVER
http://pacific.scoop.co.nz/2010/05/samoa-is-not-free-observes-the-editor%e2%80%93in-chief-of-samoa-observer/
By Thakur Ranjit Singh
BRISBANE (Pacific Scoop/Pacific Media Watch): The first day to formally mark World Press Freedom Day at the University of Queensland in Brisbane started off on the morning of May 2 with the Australian national anthem, followed by an indigenous cultural welcome by the Nanukul Yugera group. Following formal speeches and a plenary session, the afternoon session was of particular importance to the Pacific.
Titled "Threats to media freedom and freedom of information in the South Pacific," the session heard speakers from across the Pacific.
Chaired by Ashley Wickham, former general manager of the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corporation and who now works in the prime minister's office, the panel included Fiji Times deputy editor Sophie Foster, Pacific Freedom Forum co-chair Susuve Laumaea of Papua New Guinea, founding member of Wave women's media advocacy group Lisa Williams-Lahari and Marie-Noelle Ferrieux-Patterson, president of the Vanuatu branch of Transparency International.
Another panel member was Savea Sano Malifa, founder, publisher and editor-in-chief of the Samoa Observer. He declared boldly that apart from Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and Fiji, media in Samoa was also not free.
Savea was critical of his government and echoed the sentiments that freedom in Samoa was a myth. He cited his personal experience giving incidents of his paper's struggles to operate in an environment of freedom that a democracy enshrines.
However, he cited cases of his government's abuse of its two-thirds majority to make and change laws and abuse the legal machinery to frustrate freedom of media that the Samoa Observer wished to practise in his country.
"The manner in which these legal proceedings had been handled clearly showed it was an attempt to bankrupt the newspaper. First, the PM sued for defamation, then he arranged for an overseas Queen's Counsel to defend him, later the government hired an overseas judge to hear the case, and then
armed with its two-thirds majority in Parliament, the government got that substantial sum of money approved for the PM's legal fees, later when the hearing began, the PM refused to give evidence, and yet he was supposed to explain how he had been defamed, which was also when he would have been cross-examined, then the judge appeared shocked but he allowed the trial to go ahead anyway," Savea told the media conference.
Stifling media
He said the Samoan government had abused its democratic majority to pass laws not only to stifle media but also to approve legal fees for Prime Minister, parliamentarians and government officials who could freely sue the papers without dipping into their own pockets.
This threat of financial ruin of newspapers was a means of keeping the Samoan media under control. He told of his frustrations when life became very gloomy with so much government pressure that it was difficult to produce a newspaper.
At one point, Savea had decided to give up but the public was very supportive and he decided to continue.
In explaining how the principles of democracy in the Pacific can be abused, he cited the case of his country.
"In Samoa, where the Constitution can be changed by a two-thirds majority of Parliament, the government has been holding defiantly onto that majority over the last 20 years by using public resources under its control to achieve that purpose, so that compromising has been impossible.
"Which means that while the government has been enjoying that majority, it has also been quite liberal in changing the Constitution to maintain its supremacy, while at the same time making new laws, one of which amounts to deliberate threat on media freedom, and freedom of information.
"Called the Printers and Publishers Act 1992, this law directs publishers and editors to reveal their sources of information to government leaders – PM, cabinet ministers, MPs, heads of government departments – who claim they have been defamed by the media, mainly newspapers," said Savea.
He said the Samoan government used the British law of criminal libel, which carries the penalty of six months in jail, against his newspaper, the Samoa Observer. He revealed that this ancient law was meant to quell rebellion and treason in Great Britain's colonies around the world. He believed New Zealand, Canada or Australia did not have this law in their law books. However it had been used in Samoa in an attempt to put the editor behind bars.
"And so, as we can now see, governments are quite capable of using any old law to stifle press freedom and freedom of information in their countries. In Samoa, not only is the government constitutionally able to make any new law it wants, it is also financially able to use foreign lawyers and judges, to carry out its desires legally," he said.
Manipulated system
Savea questioned where that freedom and that peace existed in the Pacific when governments were capable of manipulating the democratic system and the legal machinery to do things that dictators were doing.
"Today, it is interesting to see that Samoa's prime minister, Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, is having a go at Fiji's strongman Frank Bainimarama, accusing him of being a dictator. Yet in Samoa we have a law called the Publishers and Printers Act 1992 which does exactly what the Bainimarama government is doing in Fiji and we also have criminal libel law which is doing the same, if not worse than what is happening in Fiji," Savea said.
He challenged the Samoan government, saying that if it really wanted to call Bainimarama a dictator then it perhaps needed to walk its talk and make Samoa free for its media. To do this, the PM needed to remove all the restrictive policies threatening to stifle media freedom and freedom of information in his own country.
He could start this by repealing the Publishers and Printers Act 1992, declare defunct the policy allowing public funds to be used for the legal fees incurred by government leaders suing newspapers for defamation, and "chuck out" the ancient British law of criminal libel from Samoa's law books. That would be a big improvement.
He also called on Samoan Prime Minister that if he intended to make Samoa's media "free, strong and robust" so that they could help him and his government "tackle institutional corruption," then he needed to introduce an Official Information Act in his country.
That would surely endear him to the leaders of the free world who "are just tired of having to deal with small time dictators, and only then can he earn the true right to call a dictator a dictator".
Savea said that until this was done, Samoa would not be free for the media.
"Despite glowing reports that it is free, deep inside, it is not. It is a country sobbing day and night under the rubble of suppressed freedom. Even the Church, which is supposed to be the pinnacle of freedom,
is not free. Perhaps those church leaders who are so involved in politics
should become politicians themselves, and let the rest go free," said Savea.
Thakur Ranjit Singh is a postgraduate communication studies student at AUT University and attended the World Press Freedom Day conference at University of Queensland on 2-3 May 2010.
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