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FIJI:
Independent journalists blasted by interim regime
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Title -- 3195 FIJI: Independent journalists blasted by interim regime
Date -- 7 February 2001
Byline -- None
Origin -- Pacific Media
Watch
Source -- PMW/Daily Post/Fiji Times, 7/2/1
Copyright -- PMW
Status -- Unabridged
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INDEPENDENT JOURNALISTS BLASTED BY INTERIM REGIME
SUVA (Pacific Media Watch): Three prominent Australian and New Zealand journalists have been attacked by Fiji's interim regime and sympathetic news media, embarrassed by the country's poor post-coup international image.
Award-winning Australian investigative journalist Mark Davis came under fire in the Daily Post on 7 February 2001 over last month's SBS Dateline documentary on the plight of Indo-Fijian cane farmers.
Transcripts of the programme have been widely published on Pacific internet websites, including the deposed elected Fiji government, and email listserves.
In a front page report under the banner headline, "Kubuabola slams coverage", the newspaper reported that the January 31 programme which portrayed Indo-Fijian cane farmers as landless, penniless and voiceless had been branded as "typical of the one-sided and ethnic bias" with which the land situation in Fiji was being "deliberately sensationalised".
The newspaper quoted the regime's Interim Minister for Information and Communications, Ratu Inoke Kubuabola, as criticising the programme.
"The truth of the matter is that it is the landowners who are the real victims of exploitation. They are the truly poor of the sugar industry. The farmers have been the winners," Kubuabola said.
The newspaper took the extraordinary editorial step of running the minister's political statement over much of the front page, mostly as direct quotes and with no other balancing interviews or comments.
Davis, a former Walkley Award winner, is highly regarded for his Pacific investigative reports, particularly in West Papua.
The following day, February 8, all three daiily newspapers carried the Kubuabola statement as a full-page advertisement.
Under the headline "False reporting" on the letters to the editor page, Prime Minister's Office Permanent Secretary Jioji Kotobalavu attacked Field over a report in the Fiji Times on February 1 which described regime Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase as "isolated" at the Pacific Island Conference of Leaders in Honolulu.
He accused Field of being responsible for a "false and malicious" rumour about the health of former President Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara when he was in "top form" chairing the meeting.
Kotobalavu also took a swipe at reporters such as Field who were claimed to be "blinded by their own arrogant sense of self-importance."
"Perhaps New Zealand reporter Field so badly missed the disruptive influence of New Zealand and Australia that he started making false and malicious allegations and insinuations to make something out of nothing," he said.
Kotobalavu said that as a "palagi" (outsider), Field clearly had "no understanding and appreciation of Fijian and Pacific Island culture". The permanent secretary implied that the Kiribati Government acted correctly in barring Field from the South Pacific Forum last October.
Field is regarded as one of the more perceptive journalists covering the region.
On February 10, in a letter published in the Fiji Times headed "Racist comments", Field rejected Kotobalavu's claims, saying the "gratuitous and inappropriate racist comments" in the permanent secretary's letter required a reply.
"Rumours fantastic, unusual, weird and wildly wrong are a fact of Suva life. Stories about many a senior government official's behaviour are legend but I assure your readers that I did not in any way contribute to this particular rumour and as soon as I heard it (it would seem long after everybody else in Fiji had heard it), I rapidly checked it," Field said.
"And as is the case with so many rumours in the Pacific, we did not feel it warranted any attention at all on a news service dedicated to the distribution of accurate and timely news reports."
The analysis, Coup coup land: The press and the putsch in Fiji , has been bitterly condemned by the Fiji Times and the Pacific Islands News Association (PINA), and in an email and internet campaign by one of the magazine's editors.
The Fiji Times publisher and chief editor met University of the South Pacific authorities and in a letter demanded the ousting of Robie as USP's journalism programme coordinator. However, the administration upheld academic freedom and rejected "censorship".
Bitter personal attacks are characteristic of Fiji news media while issues are not well canvassed.
Pacific magazine "storm" article on Pacific Islands Report
David Robie's reply on Pacific Islands report
Background on Fiji media coup coverage
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