{"id":6821,"date":"2020-01-17T12:30:14","date_gmt":"2020-01-17T02:30:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/testblogs.griffith.edu.au\/asiainsights\/?p=6821"},"modified":"2023-03-10T10:51:52","modified_gmt":"2023-03-10T00:51:52","slug":"media-repression-in-melanesia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/testblogs.griffith.edu.au\/asiainsights\/media-repression-in-melanesia\/","title":{"rendered":"Media repression in Melanesia"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I\nwas exceptionally fortunate to be invited to attend the recent <a href=\"https:\/\/www.griffith.edu.au\/learning-futures\/service-learning\/events-and-innovation\/melanesian-media-freedom-forum\">Melanesia\nMedia Freedom Forum<\/a> at the Griffith University\u2019s South Bank campus in Brisbane. It\nbrought together an outstanding group of practising journalists from Fiji,\nVanuatu, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, the Autonomous Region of\nBougainville and West Papua.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Personally\nI knew quite a few of those who attended thanks to the many years that I spent\ncovering the Melanesian region for the ABC both as the long-time ABC PNG\ncorrespondent and, later, travelling throughout the islands reporting for both Radio\nAustralia and for what is now the unfortunately discontinued ABC international\ntelevision service, Australian Network.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I\nam well aware of the challenges these Melanesian colleagues of mine face. I was\ndeported from both Papua New Guinea and Fiji. As an aside, I can tell you PNG\ndoes it a bit better. The government there not only allowed me back but has\nhonoured me with two awards, an MBE and, more recently, making me a Companion\nof the Order of the Star of Melanesia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Fred\nWesley, the Editor-In-Chief of the <em>Fiji Times<\/em>, was one of those invited\nand told us of the sedition charges brought against him by Commodore\nBainimarama\u2019s Government. Thankfully, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2018-05-22\/fiji-court-finds-journalists-not-guilty\/9787324\">the\ncourts in Fiji threw the case out<\/a>. Wesley also said Fiji\u2019s\nonerous Media Act provided for the imposition of heavy fines and possible\nprison sentences on individual members of staff as well as the company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Another\nreally fine Fijian journalist attending the Forum, Samisoni Pareti, who is a\nclose friend, also had a <a href=\"https:\/\/pmc.aut.ac.nz\/pacific-media-watch\/fiji-islands-business-director-blasts-police-detention-intimidatory-10135\">run\nin with the authorities<\/a> there. Pareti is the Editor of <em>Islands Business<\/em>\nand after publishing a story suggesting that a magistrate who ruled against the\ngovernment would not have his contract renewed, he and two others were called\nin for police questioning. The police took their mobile phones and computers for\nexamination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Writing\nabout these two cases, Nic MacClellan, a journalist with many years\u2019 experience\nin the Pacific, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lowyinstitute.org\/the-interpreter\/sedition-and-pacific-media-freedom\">wrote<\/a> that: \u201cFor\njournalists working in small island states, treading on the toes of someone\npowerful in government or business is an occupational hazard for which, sooner\nor later, they\u2019ll make you pay. In recent years, however, there is a noticeable\ntrend to use serious legal charges to hobble journalists and media\norganisations&nbsp;in an attempt to promote a climate of self-censorship.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Victor Mambor, a West Papuan journalist, spoke\nof how Melanesian journalists in West Papua faced racism and threats and\nintimidation. He told the Forum of how he had had a gun held to his head in\nfront of his wife by Indonesian security forces. And of how the Indonesian\nGovernment <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2019\/08\/indonesia-blocks-internet-west-papua-protest-rages-190822022809234.html\">closed down the Internet in West Papua<\/a> because it did not like what was being put online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As soon as the Forum was over, those attending\nwere presented with an immediate example of how tough life can be for a\njournalist in Melanesia. Dan McGarry, a Canadian citizen who has lived in\nVanuatu for many years and has a ni-Vanuatu family there, was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.smh.com.au\/politics\/federal\/journalist-says-his-ban-from-returning-to-vanuatu-linked-to-china-coverage-20191118-p53bn1.html\">prevented from boarding his flight home to Port Vila<\/a> following a directive from the Vanuatu government to the airline. McGarry\nhad already been forced to step aside from his position as Media Director of\nthe Pacific nation\u2019s only daily newspaper, the <em>Vanuatu Daily Post<\/em>. The\ngovernment claimed that the job should be done by a citizen of Vanuatu.\nHowever, his own application for citizenship appears to be a never-ending saga.\nThe courts in Vanuatu ruled that the government had no basis to refuse his\nre-entry to the country. McGarry believes that amongst the reasons he has been\ntargeted is because of the <em>Daily Post\u2019s<\/em> reports about the growing\ninfluence of China in Vanuatu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Another participant at the forum, Papua New Guinea\u2019s pre-eminent online journalist, Scott Waide, who also works for EMTV, agreed with McGarry. He told Radio Australia\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/radio-australia\/programs\/pacificbeat\/pacific-journalists-unite-for-media-freedom\/11703170\"><em>Pacific Beat<\/em><\/a> program that \u201cPacific governments are seeing what can be done to the media &#8230; and taking notes from the Chinese government basically. I&#8217;m not saying China&#8217;s directly telling them to do it but people watch, people learn&#8221;. Waide said media freedom was on a &#8220;dangerous downward trend&#8221; in the region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Many\nof those who&#8217;ve come (to this Melanesian Media Freedom Forum) have been\npersecuted by their governments, arrested or questioned or intimidated with\nlawsuits against them or sacked and threatened with sackings.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">One\ncomplaint raised during the Forum regarded the negative role of some well-paid\nadvisers in the region. As the final communique put it: \u201cObstruction from\ndevelopment partners and communications consultants, including from Australia,\nare in some instances contributing to problems of lack of access to\ndecision-makers.\u201d One of the participants from Solomon Islands gave an example\nof this sort of behaviour during the Australian led Regional Assistance Mission\nto Solomon Islands, RAMSI.&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In my own address to the Forum I said it was\nsad that things appeared to be getting worse not better for media freedom in\nthe Pacific. I said I had nothing but the greatest admiration for my friends\nand colleagues who every day were playing a major role in upholding democracy\nin Melanesia and doing their best to let the people of their countries know\nwhat was really going on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And I urged them to keep in contact with each\nother and ensure that the media freedom fire in Melanesia kept burning. The\nMelanesia Media Freedom Forum was a fabulous opportunity to establish the\nlinkages to facilitate that contact. We must build on this into the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">You can read the \u2018Outcome Statement\u2019 released by the Melanesia Media Freedom Forum <a href=\"https:\/\/www.griffith.edu.au\/__data\/assets\/pdf_file\/0016\/910123\/MMFF-Outcome-Statement.pdf\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"author label wp-block-paragraph\">AUTHOR<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Sean Dorney<\/strong>, a long-time former Foreign Correspondent with the ABC, is now a Non-Resident Fellow with the Lowy Institute for International Policy. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I was exceptionally fortunate to be invited to attend the recent Melanesia Media Freedom Forum at the Griffith University\u2019s South Bank campus in Brisbane. It brought together an outstanding group of practising journalists from Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, the Autonomous Region of Bougainville and West Papua. Personally I knew quite a few [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":6822,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1755,1021,248,1056],"tags":[323,1071,1072,936,1070,1044,969,935,961],"class_list":["post-6821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-governance-democracy","category-pacific-outlook","category-png-and-the-pacific","category-politics","tag-fiji","tag-fourth-estate","tag-journalism","tag-media","tag-media-repression","tag-melanesia","tag-pacific-islands","tag-papua-new-guinea","tag-vanuatu"],"acf":[],"modified_by":"Kelsey 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We have seen some significant political shifts across the region. In Papua New Guinea, the Prime Minister, James Marape has reshuffled his cabinet. 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It covers various topics including the upcoming BRI Forum, Compact negotiations, Vanuatu's new Prime Minister, Pacific tourists caught in Israel violence, Forum Trade Ministers meeting in Fiji, and Tuvalu's new Constitution.","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Region | Papua New Guinea and the Pacific&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Region | Papua New Guinea and the Pacific","link":"https:\/\/testblogs.griffith.edu.au\/asiainsights\/category\/pacific-outlook\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Griffith University Pacific Outlook banner - map of the Pacific region over a beach background.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/testblogs.griffith.edu.au\/asiainsights\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/pacific-outlook-banner-900x500-copy-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/testblogs.griffith.edu.au\/asiainsights\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/pacific-outlook-banner-900x500-copy-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/testblogs.griffith.edu.au\/asiainsights\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/pacific-outlook-banner-900x500-copy-1.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/testblogs.griffith.edu.au\/asiainsights\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/pacific-outlook-banner-900x500-copy-1.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":10335,"url":"https:\/\/testblogs.griffith.edu.au\/asiainsights\/pacific-outlook-bulletin-6-december\/","url_meta":{"origin":6821,"position":5},"title":"Pacific Outlook Bulletin | 6 December","author":"Griffith Asia Institute","date":"6 December 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"TESS NEWTON CAIN\u00a0 |\u00a0 COP28 Begins Amongst much by way of controversy, the 28th Conference of the Parties (COP28) is now underway in the United Arab Emirates. 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