Fiji Prime Minister dangling more promises to lure voter who are employed as civil servants.
Fiji Minister for Home Affairs whose vitriolic remarks attempt to misinform Fiji citizens on the legal comments outlawing restrictions to the freedom of movement in rural villages. The Fijian Affairs Board adds more confusion and is perceived as increasingly dabbling in political matters and neglecting the development and social mobility in rural villages.
Particularly in the un-audited accounts of the various provincial councils.
Fiji Times Editorial of Sat. March 25th 2006, furiously defends their article and in the same stroke condeming the Minster.
Vosanibola erred
Saturday, March 25, 2006
Home Affairs Minister Josefa Vosanibola misses the point.
By condemning The Fiji Times front-page article yesterday in which lawyer Richard Naidu gave an opinion on the legal right of people to enter villages as "grossly inflammatory and irresponsible", he obviously fails to grasp the point of the article.
The Fiji Times had invited Mr Naidu, a senior partner with the law firm Munro Leys which by the way handle this newspaper's legal cases, to express a legal opinion on the right of people to move around in public places.
As Mr Vosanibola will note in the first paragraph of the article, Mr Naidu refers to the "legal right" of the provincial councils and traditional leaders rather than any other rights like, say, as owners of the land.
Mr Naidu interprets the law as simply as possible so that the ordinary reader understands there is nothing to stop them from moving about in public places such as roads, parks and rivers as they see fit. In other words to totally ban someone or some group from entering a province is illegal
Mr Naidu gives a legal opinion on what we think is an important issue and we published that opinion. And the publishing of that opinion is very much part of our duty to disseminate information, educating people on what they can or cannot do.
Mr Vosanibola knows that any sensible and responsible person knows that there are certain protocols to observe when entering villages or traditional settlements. And they will certainly observe those protocols.
Nowhere in the story does Mr Naidu say that people should enter these areas and ignore whatever protocols are there to be observed.
The point is about freedom of movement rather then ignoring protocols.
As for the army's Truth and Justice campaign, Mr Vosanibola should know that this newspaper has expressed on it and does not support it. The purpose of the article is not to encourage the soldiers to enter villages forcefully and conduct their campaigns without following the accepted procedures.
There is no intention to, as he puts it, "inflame the situation''. We are a responsible media organisation and will strongly oppose any actions to incite violence and law-breaking.
The military has its own legal advisers to give opinions to those in command on such matters.
One would have thought that as a former Minister for Information and after a reasonably long association with the media, Mr Vosanibola would have better understood its role.
Fiji Broadcaster defends sacking of talkback host
Fiji Government's claim of freedom of the Press and Fiji Broadcasting Commission Ltd is a farcical application of ideals.
Fiji's state-owned Fiji Broadcasting Corporation is strongly denying claims by the opposition Labour Party that it sacked a popular talkback radio host due to government pressure. Sitiveni Raturala was sacked after he interviewed the commander of Fiji's military, Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama, on his show. Mr Raturala claims his sacking was due to FBCL being afraid of the government, which has been locked in a war of words with the military commander for several months.
HILL: The dispute centres on the way Sitiveni Raturala changed the format of his talkback show when Commodore Bainimarama appeared, taking no calls, and allowing the commander to name names of people allegedly involved in coup activity.
FBCL is sensitive about being seen to be politically partisan, and removed the popular talkback host for breaking rules about balance. Sitiveni Raturala himself is unrepentant.
RATURALA: They made a big mistake, well put it this way, if I were to do it again, that program, I'd do it all over again just the same way I did it.
HILL: Could there have been a danger though that in doing that, you might give the impression that the army was somehow using Radio Fiji for its own purposes?
RATURALA: No I didn't see it that way. As I said I've always wanted the Commander, I've been after him for the past three years. No I don't see it that way. I've been overwhelmed, inundated with calls since I was fired, and now, three weeks down the line I'm still having calls from my colleagues, in the papers and TV people I know. And the question they're asking is this, if it happened to you, this is what they told me, could it happen to us as well?
HILL: Why do you think that Radio Fiji did this? Was there, as some have been suggesting, that they were sort of ordered to by the government or do you think it was just off their own bat? Were they perhaps scared of the government and didn't want to upset them?
RATURALA: You hit the nail right on the head.
HILL: Opposition leader Mahendra Chaudhry, of the Fiji Labour Party, believes the government is much more directly responsible for Sitivenui Raturala's sacking.
CHAUDHRY: It's highly likely that the orders must have come from the government. I don't think Radio Fiji would have done it on its own volition because the reporter is a well-known figure, and I'm sure that he would have obtained clearance for doing this interview.
The government has also not given any reason as to why this dismissal has taken place, nor has Radio Fiji given any reasons why. They've done that with TV also to some extent. They're controlling TV1, now that's the only news channel that we have here. But I can clearly see a bias in their reporting, and the Daily Post, of course, the other newspaper, which is a substantially government-owned newspaper, that's also throwing out government propaganda quite unashamedly and in violation of journalistic ethics.
HILL: But this has been vehemently rejected by FBCL's CEO Francis Herman.
He says they must be seen to be as fair and balanced as possible.
Francis Herman says Mr Raturala broke the normal format of his show in a way that endangered the station's reputation for impartiality.
HERMAN: In this case, all talk, the telephone calls were all stopped, the guest was allowed to speak as he wanted to without any interruption or questions from the listeners. Bruce, I'm no politician, and neither am I interested in getting involved in the political mud slinging. All I'm interested in making sure that our radio company continues to exercise a good sense of judgement in ensuring that we are balanced, we are accurate, we give all sides of the story in the same program if possible, and so we don't take sides. So our radio station is not used like it was in 1987 and the year 2000.
HILL: The leader of the opposition Mahendra Chaudhry more or less accuses you of taking orders to get rid of Sitiveni Raturala from the government?
HERMAN: That's not true, that's totally untrue and I'm surprised that Mr Chaudhry has made those comments. I think I'd like to refresh their memories of what happened when they were in government, and the directives that they gave the FBC to remove a particular talk show host simply because they didn't like the content of his programs.
Presenter/Interviewer: Bruce Hill
Speakers: Sitiveni Raturala. sacked talkback host, Mahendra Chaudhry, Fiji's opposition leader
Fiji Media Council seems to out of touch with the whole episode. Probably an indication that the Council only protects the Media Companies more than their employees.
Posted below are Fiji Media Council's procedure for lodging a complaint.
S.I.F.M will email a bonafide complaint to the council to ascertain their effectiveness.
COMPLAINT PROCEDURE
Any complaints?
While the Media council exists to preserve the freedom of the press and broadcast media within the Country, it also functions as a forum to which anyone may put a complaint against the media. Its authority rests in the willingness of publishers, editors arid broadcasters to respect the Council's views, accept its rulings and publicly admit mistakes.
The Complaints Committee is totally independent and consists of three Media Council members who represent the interests of the public. They are Chairman Mr Daryl Tarte, Mr Thomas Raju arid Mr Paula Sotutu.
The Committee will hear complaints concerning any media organisatioll in the Fiji Islands whether a member of the Media Council or not.
Here's how the Media Council's complaint procedures work:
Step 1. If you have a complaint against a media organisation you should notify that organisation's senior executive by letter, fax or email and forward a copy of the complaint to the Secretary, Media Council (Fiji) Ltd. at the address shown below. Complaints must be lodged within one month of the date of publication or broadcast.
Step 2. If after two weeks no satisfactory response to your complaint has been received and the Secretary has been unable to resolve the matter the complaint will be referred to the Chairman of the Complaints Committee
Step 3. The Chairman will decide whether or not the matter falls within the jurisdiction of the Complaint Committee. If it does and he considers an immediate settlement possible, he may take the matter up with the media organisation concerned. Alternatively, he will ask you to sign a document waiving any legal rights before proceeding further.
Step 4. If your complaint is accepted and you have signed a legal waiver, the Chairman will refer the complaint to the Complaint Committee for adjudication.
Step 5. The adjudication procedure is at the Chairman's discretion. He may a) invite the parties to appear before the Committee, or b) consider the complaint on the basis of written submissions. If the parties are to appear before the Committee, the names and official positions of the nominated persons should be stated. Legal council may not represent either party. The hearing will take the form of a discussion not a trial. The Committee may uphold or dismiss a complaint, or simply express an opinion on the matter. It has no power to penalise or issue orders of compliance with its findings.
Step 6. A copy of the Committee's adjudication will be sent to both parties. The organisation against which the complaint was made is expected to publish the adjudication. If it does not do so within one week, copies of the adjudication may be released to other media organisations for publication. The Committee reserves the right to restrict publication in special circumstances.
For more information about complaint procedures, or if you wish to lodge a complaint, please contact:
Bob Pratt
Executive Secretary,
Media Council (Fiji) ltd.
P. O. Box 11852,
Suva,
Phone/Fax 3317055
Email: rjfpratt@connect.com.fj
© Fiji Media Council 2002
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