Doctoral thesis, University of the South Pacific. 2004
By David Robie
University education for South Pacific journalists is a relatively recent development. It has existed in Papua New Guinea for merely a generation; it is less than a decade old at degree level in Fiji, and in the former colonies in Polynesia. At the same time, mean age, experience and educational qualifications have been rising among journalists in the major Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) member countries, Australia and New Zealand, as the news media has become more professionalised.
While the Papua New Guinea media has largely depended on journalism education to provide the foundation for its professionalism, Fiji has focused on a system of ad hoc short course training funded by international donors. This thesis examines the history of South Pacific university media education and its impact on the region’s journalism. Its first objective is to test the hypothesis that tertiary education has a critical influence on how Pacific journalists practise their profession and perceive their political and social role in a developing society faced with the challenges of globalisation.
Secondly, the thesis aims to analyse the political, economic and legal frameworks in which the media have operated in Papua New Guinea and Fiji since independence. Third, the thesis aims to explain and assess in detail the development of journalism education in the South Pacific since independence.
The theoretical framework is from a critical political economy perspective. It also assesses whether the concept of development journalism, which had its roots in the 1980s debate calling for a ‘New International Information and Communication Order’ (NWICO), has had an influence on a Pacific style of journalism.
The thesis argues within a context where journalists can be considered to be professionals with some degree of autonomy within the confines set by a capitalist and often transnational-owned media, and within those established by governments and media companies.
Journalists are not solely ‘governed’ by these confines; they still have some freedom to act, and journalism education can deliver some of the resources to make the most of that freedom.
The thesis includes historical case studies of the region’s three main journalism schools, Divine Word University (PNG), University of Papua New Guinea and the University of the South Pacific. It demonstrates some of the dilemmas faced by the three schools, student journalists and graduates while exercising media freedom.
Research was conducted using the triangulation method, incorporating in-depth interviews with 57 editors, media managers, journalists and policy makers; two newsroom staff surveys of 15 news organisations in Fiji and Papua New Guinea in 1998/9 (124 journalists) and 2001 (106); and library and archives study. It also draws on the author’s personal experience as coordinator of the UPNG (1993-1997) and USP (1998-2002) journalism programmes for more than nine years.
The thesis concludes that journalists in Papua New Guinea (where university education has played a vital role for a generation) are more highly educated, have a higher mean experience and age, and a more critically sophisticated perception of themselves and their media role in Pacific societies than in Fiji (where almost half the journalists have no formal tertiary education or training).
Journalists in Fiji are also more influenced by race, cultural and religious factors. Conversely, PNG journalists are poorly paid even when compared with their Fiji colleagues. There are serious questions about the impact that this may have on the autonomy of journalists and the Fourth Estate role of news media in a South Pacific democracy.
Robie, D. (2003). Journalism education in the South Pacific, 1975-2003: politics, policy and practice.
[Two volumes, 908 pages, colour illustrations, maps]
(Doctoral thesis, University of the South Pacific, Pacific Collection, Suva, Fiji. Copy held at Auckland Public Libraries).
Duran Angiki (left) and David Robie at the Public Right to Know conference at the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism (ACIJ), 15 September 2002.
Many Pacific Islands neophyte journalists face a baptism of fire. It often takes raw courage to be a journalist in the Pacific. DAVID ROBIE writes about media issues after recently ending a decade of journalism education in the region.
Barely two years ago masked Fijian gunmen seized a consignment of books from the United States bound for the University of the South Pacific journalism programme in Suva. The small cardboard box was stashed in a courier mail van hijacked by coup front man George Speight’s supporters hoping to find hard cash.
Two months later the carton was recovered by police from the ransacked Parliament and handed over to me; torn open but contents intact. Ironically, inside were six copies of Betty Medsger’s Winds of Change: Challenges Confronting Journalism Education.
This was a poignant reminder of the realities facing Pacific media. Politics in the region are increasingly being determined by terrorism, particularly in Melanesia; such as in Fiji, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.
And with this development comes a greater demand on the region’s media and journalists for more training and professionalism. Most journalists are young, relatively inexperienced and lowly paid.
Since Speight’s illegal seizure of Parliament on 19 May 2000, politics in Fiji has remained under the spectre of terrorism. While the Speight upheaval cost a relatively modest 15 lives–all Fijian–the fear of it happening again, and next time being even bloodier, is still a concern.
Fiji’s politics is driven by fear and a continuing threat to reinvoke terrorism if governments do not pursue a narrow particular direction, defined as ensuring “indigenous paramountcy”.
Fiji is already a country prone to having coups (three so far) and risks becoming consigned to a fate of economic, political, and legal instability; a “banana republic”. Respect for the law is rapidly diminishing.
Few people believe Speight will serve more than a token symbolic period of his life sentence for treason in “prison”; he is detained on the tropical isle of Nukulau off Suva, a former haven for local picnickers.
Ten of his co-conspirators who pleaded guilty to lesser charges were given minor jail sentences (none will serve more than three years), while two–leading journalist Jo Nata and chiefly politician Ratu Timoci Silatolu–have denied the treason charges and at the time of writing await trial.
The role of Nata — “I was just a public relations consultant”– is at the centre of crucial issues in Fiji over journalism ethics, integrity, and independence.
One of Fiji’s first journalism graduates (at an Australian university), Nata was formerly coordinator of the Fiji Journalism Institute, a training centre established by media industry people that eventually closed under a cloud in 1999 about accountability over donor agency funding.
Another Fijian journalist, Margaret Wise, sacked as chief-of-staff of The Fiji Times, has also recently been at the centre of debate over ethics and her paternity action against former coup leader and prime minister Sitiveni Rabuka.
Editorial headlines such as “Don’t shoot the messenger” highlight the hypocrisy in the Fiji media when defending perceived threats to media freedom. There is little debate about the quality of the media itself and whether the Pacific gets the critical journalism that it deserves.
Other countries such as Australia and New Zealand have “mediawatch” style programmes on television and radio, and columns in newspapers, that vigorously question the media. News programmes also regularly invite journalism school commentators for views as they are independent from commercial interests.
Such lively debate is healthy for improvements in the media. After all, the watchdog also watching to ensure it doesn’t become a lapdog.
Award-winning documentary maker Senator ‘Atu Emberson-Bain was incensed after Fiji Television refused to show her excellent documentary, In the Name of Growth, exposing the appalling exploitation of indigenous women workers by an indigenous owned Pafco (Pacific Fishing Company) tuna canning plant on Ovalau Island:
“So much for the free (television) media in this country — the debate always focuses on freedom from government interference.,” Dr Emberson-Bain said.
“What about freedom from the big (private sector) boys on the block with their vested interests?”
While Fiji TV turned down her programme on spurious grounds, SBS TV broadcast it in Australia and bought exclusive broadcast rights for four years. It was also nominated in the best documentary category at the 21st Annual Hawai’i International Film Festival.
After more than two and a half decades reporting and teaching journalism in the region, at times involving controversy, my most nerve wracking time was perhaps being twice arrested in New Caledonia during 1987 by French military forces, once at gunpoint near the east coast village of Canala. At the time I was covering the militarisation of indigenous Kanak villages in an attempt to suppress the struggle for independence.
One of the problems was my book on the 1985 Rainbow Warrior bombing, Eyes of Fire, which was not popular with French colonial authorities.
The Fiji crisis highlighted many dilemmas about culture and conflict. Customary obligations can be a burden on journalists.
“Under pressure they can succumb to the demands of traditional loyalties,” argues former Fiji Daily Post editor Jale Moala. Writing about the Speight putsch in my book The Pacific Journalist, he said:
“The problem that arose here was not so much one of reporters taking sides, as it may have seemed at the time, but the inability of many reporters to function objectively under the pressures of the crisis. A lack of leadership in newsrooms was one reason.”
According to Agence France-Presse correspondent Michael Field — who has had the biggest share of bannings of any journalist in the Pacific, having being shut out of Kiribati, Nauru, Tonga, and even Fiji at one stage — the region has been going through something of an unprecedented crackdown against journalists.
Student journalists have also faced victimisation over their reporting. Many incidents involving threats and attempted gaggings have impacted on USP student journalists working on their newspaper Wansolwara.
But the “shooting the messenger” syndrome always had more serious consequences in Papua New Guinea. Two University of PNG reporters on Uni Tavur gave testimony last year before a commission of inquiry examining the causes of the shooting to death of four young Papua New Guineans during the protests against structural adjustment.
While I was at UPNG, two senior Uni Tavur reporters were beaten up one night because of their front page report on a political dispute between two national student politics leaders, both from the province of Enga.
On another occasion, drunken off-duty officers attacked a group of Uni Tavur students and me inside a police barracks. One student journalist was forced to go into hiding after he reported a funding scandal involving the then Miss UPNG.
Rarely do Australian or New Zealand journalism schools encounter this degree of “direct action” over stories. For many Pacific Islands neophyte journalists, it is a baptism of fire.
Not only does truth hurt, it can sometimes lead to a brutal act of retribution. It often takes raw courage to be a journalist in the Pacific.
Originally published in Pacific Weekly Review, September 30-October 6 edition.
USP Journalism Coordinator David Robie writing on Cafe Pacific: . . . "Independent university courses don't fit comfortably with this grand scheme [of the Pacific media industry's PINA] because they teach critical thinking as well as vocational skills." Image: Alyson Young/AUT
During his time at the University of the South Pacific, Journalism Coordinator David Robie endured numerous attacks from some senior sections of the Fiji press and one Pacific media organisation — PINA. What was behind it and why were they so intent on getting rid of him? Just before Robie left Fiji after five years last Friday [June 2002], he told his side of the story and why he believes personal agendas are corrupting media in the Pacific.
David Robie, the University of the South Pacific’s former journalism coordinator, left Fiji last week after five controversial years.
It’s the end of an era of sorts for Pacific journalism education, an often stormy era in which Robie has been both praised and vilified for his efforts.
The bare facts would appear to speak for themselves. For much of the time, Robie has been running the entire programme alone, away from his family in New Zealand, designing the course, teaching the course, supervising the students’ newspaper Wansolwara, operating websites, and — as USP Vice Chancellor Savenaca Siwatibau said — “living in his office”.
In between holding the programme together, he sat on committees overseeing media training in the Pacific, published books and articles and lobbied the university, eventually successfully, for funding to expand the programme.
Under his guidance, the student newspaper and website won 10 awards or citations in the regional Journalism Education Association’s annual Ossie awards.
Robie says his work at USP has helped produce a cadre of journalists with a broad, and most importantly ethical, grounding in journalism across multiple media disciplines, something that, with the exception of Papua New Guinea, he says was previously lacking in the Pacific.
“In the region, mostly journalists have had minimal training and usually short-course training if they’re lucky — many of them have not really had much training at all.”
55 graduates from USP
USP has produced 55 graduates from its journalism programme since its inception in 1994 — 49 of them under Robie’s tutelage. Two-thirds of those graduates are now working in the media industry itself, Robie says, and most of the others are in media-related jobs with NGOs and other organisations.
Robie heads to New Zealand’s Auckland University of Technology leaving the USP programme in much better health than he found it — though perhaps the legacy of routine 16-hour days and seven-day weeks has not been so kind to his personal health. The university has just agreed to start work on a new F$250,000 building for the journalism school to replace the current “ad hoc” facilities. There are also two new full-time lecturers.
Vice-Chancellor Savenaca Siwatibau told the student newspaper Wansolwara this month that “the beginning of the programme and the funding were on shaky grounds. It was David who ran with it and now, of course, it’s working. We need to thank David for that”.
Even though the programme is working, there is no doubt it has suffered to an extent from being, for the most part, a one-man show. Robie is not Superman and some students say certain modules of the course were under-taught. Until now, attempts by USP to find colleagues for Robie have been short-lived. One student has put this down to personality clashes between lecturers, though Robie dismisses the suggestion.
But Robie sees the new building as a vote of confidence in his work and he seems to have repaid the confidence USP showed in him in the face of sustained attacks from specific quarters of Fiji-based media.
The latest attack came just last week in a story marking Robie’s departure broadcast on Radio Australia’s Pacific Beat programme. In an interview with reporter James Panichi, Robert Keith-Reid, publisher of Pacific with Islands Business magazine, delivered a bitter assault on Robie. The attack was largely personal and Keith-Reid did not offer any specific criticisms of Robie’s work. But he did complain that before Robie came along, his company had enjoyed a good relationship with the USP programme.
That might seem strange, since there had only been six graduates out of USP Journalism before Robie arrived, but Robie himself said he was not entirely surprised by the tone of Keith-Reid’s comments.
‘Enemies’ and no secret It’s been no secret in Pacific media circles that Keith-Reid and other senior Islands Business staff, current and former, have been enemies of Robie since 1988, when Robie resigned as an Islands Business correspondent after Keith-Reid and editor Peter Lomas published an attack on him by New Caledonian right-winger David Los, who objected to Robie’s perceived sympathy for the Kanak independence movement.
To Robie’s dismay, Islands Business offered him no right of reply, and Robie’s lawyer forced the magazine to publish an apology in the following issue. Islands Business then hired Los, a teacher with no experience in journalism, as a correspondent, which dismayed Robie enough for him to resign and join rival magazine Pacific Islands Monthly.
Robie then published a story criticising the personal agendas he believed were controlling regional Pacific media. Islands Business was apparently deeply stung, as it reprinted the entire article in breach of copyright and ran three separate opinion pieces — from Keith-Reid, Los and Lomas — devoted to rubbishing Robie. The entire exercise took up five pages. Pacific Islands Monthly labelled it “an embarrassing reflection on the state of Pacific media” and even former Islands Business editor John Richardson slammed it.
Robie launched a F$135,000 defamation suit. Indeed, what would appear to be a fierce vendetta against Robie on the part of Islands Business and the Pacific Islands News Association (PINA) — which shared staff and still share the same central Suva building — has made Robie’s tenure at USP much harder than it needed to be.
Robie was not allowed to come quietly. In late 1997, the Daily Post published a series of articles expressing alarm that USP was considering hiring Robie. In a turn of phrase implying a certain remoteness between the Post and PINA, the newspaper said PINA was “understood to support” another candidate, Sarita Singh, who had impressive qualifications but no experience running a university course.
The newspaper published lengthy devotions to Singh’s CV, but offered only a clipped appraisal of Robie’s achievements, which include three decades of work as journalist in the Pacific, Europe, Africa and Australia/New Zealand, plus a five-year stint running the journalism programme at the University of Papua New Guinea.
The articles painted Robie as a left-wing troublemaker opposed to the Rabuka government.
Articles from PINA
One senior Daily Post staff member at the time has since told Robie the articles arrived through the newspaper’s fax machine on PINA letterhead! Editor of the Post at the time was Laisa Taga, who a few months later joined Islands Business. She was also treasurer of PINA.
Peter Lomas, who Robie believes is the orchestrator of the attacks on him, worked for both Islands Business and PINA.
USP refused to be bullied and went ahead with the appointments, but the Rabuka government nevertheless delayed issuing the work permits for both Robie and fellow appointee Ingrid Leary, also a New Zealand journalist, leading the Journalism Students Association to deliver a petition to Rabuka saying: “As students we are gravely concerned that the university’s academic independence appears to be compromised by outside influences”.
SVT senator Filipe Bole even raised the issue in the House and for a few weeks it was uncertain whether Robie and Leary’s work permits would be revoked.
USP vigorously defended the pair, saying outside publication was part of their job descriptions and neither lecturer was being paid for their extra-curricular work.
Reporters Sans Frontieres, the international media freedom organisation, protested strongly to Bole. The New Zealand Journalists Training Organisation fired off a letter. Pacific Media Watch and Tahiti Pacifique Magazine complained on Robie’s behalf.
Where’s ‘code of ethics’
Even Jone Davukula, former press secretary to Rabuka, wrote to the Daily Post saying “local journalists were involved in these complaints, which seem to be based mainly on these persons’ disagreement with either the views of David Robie or Ingrid Leary, or the fact that they have been lawfully employed by the USP.
“Where is the Fiji journalists’ much vaunted Code of Ethics?” he concluded.
Already, the Fiji Journalism Institute and Fiji TV had complained about the attempt on the part of the same media organisation to block Robie’s appointment.
Few within the industry seemed to be in any doubt over the real source of the campaign, even though Robie says his real enemies never came forward, preferring to work behind the scenes influencing others to attack him.
Phillip Cass, a former USP journalism lecturer from the UK, hinted at the curious source of the attacks in a letter to the Daily Post in February 1998 when he said: “That kind of antipathy towards us (Europeans) cannot be entirely because of the colour of our skin because, the last time I saw that critic, he was a great deal whiter than I am.”
Ironically it was the Daily Post, now under the editorship of Jale Moala, which followed up with an editorial pointing a rather more direct finger at the alleged culprit.
“The saddest thing is the deafening silence from the Pacific Islands News Association and the Fiji Media Council. By failing to support the rights of journalists — whether they be teachers or students or whatever — these organisations are helping to destroy the very freedom of expression they have so often said they protect,” he wrote.
‘Nobody actually investigates’
Robie was even more direct on the subject.
“You only have one or two people like that, who are mischievous, who make these false statements, and everybody else laps it up. Nobody actually investigates.”
When contacted, Lomas would not comment, and referred all questions to current PINA president Johnson Honimae, of the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corporation, who was not in the post when the campaign against Robie was taking place.
PINA did release a response though, attributed to Honimae.
“PINA members have said it is critically important that qualified Pacific Islands trainers and educators get the opportunity to train and teach in their own region. That was PINA’s position on the appointment of Mr Robie and remains unchanged where Mr Robie’s successor is concerned.”
So what was the motive behind this campaign? The settling of old scores would not seem to account sufficiently for the venom of it, and Robie says PINA’s “jobs for qualified Pacific Islanders” mantra is not credible, considering that the PINA secretariat is run by Lomas, a New Zealander who has taken a Fiji passport, and his common law wife Nina Ratulele, who was hired as PINA Nius editor and administrator without any experience in journalism. Neither went through a transparent appointment process themselves, Robie says.
“Does it have something to do with attempts to corner the lion’s share of journalism education and training funds for the South Pacific? Independent university courses don’t fit comfortably with this grand scheme because they teach critical thinking as well as vocational skills,” Robie wrote on his Cafe Pacific website in September 1998 in response to attempts to get his work permit revoked.
In an interview a few days before his departure, Robie said he is still baffled by the sheer malevolence of his critics, who he said inhabit “a whirling cesspool of intrigue and backstabbing”, but believes their motives go beyond personal differences.
‘Fundamental mindset’
“I think there’s a fundamental mindset among people in key positions in the media — editorial executives, management people — that is 15 to 20 years behind the times. Many seem to think that the world hasn’t moved on and it’s surprising in many respects because some of the people who have that mindset come from countries that have made some major changes to their whole approach to journalism training and education — Australia and New Zealand, for example.
“But many in the most influential positions in the Pacific don’t seem to have caught up with that. And I think that’s because there’s been a pattern of donor funding in the region, which is a very cosy sort of arrangement. For 25 years that’s worked very well, but it’s also created a dependency mentality in the media.
“[The attacks] were the result of petty jealousies and a sort of territorial thing. Some of the people that are behind these attacks fit into this cosy network and someone like me has different ideas. It’s a very different approach than what these people are used to and I think they see it as a threat.”
That threat may stem partly, he believes, from the possibility that the USP course’s productivity throws a sharp light on a short course approach to training that he says is largely fruitless.
“There’s a lot of misrepresentation of our programme. We use methods that are used very widely overseas. We use problem-based learning. A lot of our work is very much based on projects and the outcomes of those projects. It’s very focused on practical outcomes and when you compare that to some of the short course training around the region, where there are no real outcomes and basically anyone just attends a course, we have a very structured system on assessing the progress and abilities of the people that go through our programme.”
Donor funds are being routinely wasted in the Pacific on short course training, Robie said, and his attackers were possibly afraid that the USP course posed a threat to the steady stream of donor money on which they rely.
PINA disagree.
Entry-level education
“PINA members also believe there is a place for both entry-level education and training and continuing training and education. PINA agrees that in some situations where short form training has been driven by outside interests and not driven by the needs of the Pacific it has been a waste … this is why PINA is seeking more of a say in determining trainers. It is also why PINA members feel strongly that more of this training should be conducted by trained Pacific Islands trainers,” PINA said in a statement.
Robie said this demand for “more of a say” amounts to political interference, and he is convinced PINA’s Suva bosses want a compliant face in the USP Journalism programme who will not pose a threat to the interests of its secretariat.
“There are many people who benefit from the short course gravy train and they’re quite happy for that system to carry on.
“I’ve been on one of these major training advisory groups for six years and I leave it thinking it has not made much of a contribution to the region.”
His critics are probably delighted that he has gone, but does that mean the ugly machinations will disappear? Sadly, probably not, for it seems that as long as there are personal fiefdoms to defend within the regional media — and donors willing to fund them — there will always be someone new to attack.
Published as a full page article in the Fiji Daily Post on 30 June 2002. Also distributed by Pacnews (Pacific Islands Broadcasting Association) news agency throughout the Pacific to radio stations and newspapers, 28 June 2002.
The special 2000 coup print edition of Wansolwara, June 2000. Image: Pacific Journalism Review
Hours after a mob attached Fiji Television and cut transmission for almost 48 hours, the University of the South Pacific pulled the plug on the website, fearing a similar raid on the sprawling Laucala campus.
Undaunted, the student journalists were offered an alternative site hosted by the Department of Social Communication and Journalism at the University of Technology, Sydney, and carried on unfazed.
Robie, D. (2001). Frontline reporters: A students’ internet coup: Coverage of crises 6. Pacific Journalism Review : Te Koakoa, 7(1), 47-56. https://doi.org/10.24135/pjr.v7i1.702
“Journalists, as arch-whistleblowers, are often viewed in the same light as trouble-makers who stir up situations unnecessarily. There are deep-rooted beliefs in South Pacific societies about respect for authority that can translate into a lack of accountability and transparency, coupled with a strongly disapproving attitude towards those who question, probe and publish. The Pacific is littered with instances of publishers and journalists being chastised and chased.” — The Pacific Journalist
The Pacific Journalist, The University of the South Pacific Book Centre, March 2001.
Why do Pacific Islanders want to become journalists? In spite of often tense relationships between governments and the media in the region, and poor pay and working conditions, growing numbers of young Pacific Islanders are choosing a career in journalism — and usually seeking formal qualifications.
This book from the Journalism Programme, University of the South Pacific, looks at regional careers in the media. It covers some of the core courses of the programme, such as news values, basic news gathering, news writing and style, media law and ethics, print and online media, radio and television journalism, photojournalism, and political reporting and editorial balance.
The book is edited by USP’s journalism coordinator Dr David Robie, a New Zealand journalist with more than three decades of experience in the international and Pacific media. He has gathered a wide range of contributors, both journalists and media educators/trainers with long Pacific experience.
Publisher: The University of the South Pacific Book Centre, Suva, 2001, 371 pages
Ossie awards featured in the Panpa Bulletin, February 2021.
By Mark Pearson
The United States has its Pulitzer prizes. Australia has the Walkleys. And journalism education in the region has the Ossies, the Journalism Education Association’s awards recognising excellent journalism produced by students.
The JEA [now JERAA] is Australia-based and most of its members teach at the numerous journalism programs throughout the nation, although each year several students from New Zealand and the Pacific enter the awards.
The awards are named after journalist Osmar S White and are funded from his estate through the generosity of his daughter, journalist and author Sally A White.
Despite the overwhelming Australian membership of the JEA, the awards announced at the association’s annual conference on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast in December 2000 were dominated by entrants from the Pacific and New Zealand.
Reggie Dutt, editor of USP’s highly commended Wansolwara and an editor on the award-winning Pacific Journalism Online. Image: Frontline Reporters video screenshot/USP
Journalism students from the University of the South Pacific under the leadership of course coordinator David Robie won two of the major awards and were highly commended in four others for their reporting of the 2000 Fiji coup.
Leading industry personnel judged the awards, and all praised the efforts of the University of the South Pacific students for their coverage of the coup.
Category judge deputy editor of The Age Online, Mike van Niekirk, said the student journalists working on the publication rose to the challenge of providing high quality reports of a dramatic international news event on their doorstep.
“They did so in challenging circumstances and by providing these reports on the internet they were one of the few sources of information at critical times of the events taking place,” he wrote in his judge’s comments.
“As such, the quality of the writing is of a high standard for students. Taken as a body of work it is very impressive.”
The Wansolwara “one ocean – one people” fish with a camera logo.
There are 12 categories in all.
Sean Scanlon from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand won the award for best print feature for a postgraduate student as well as the JEA executive’s prize for best story in any medium.
The Pacific students’ website Pacific Journalism Online devoted to the daily coverage of the coup won the Dr Charles Stuart Prize for best student publication in any medium while the Pacific students’ print edition Wansolwara was a awarded a highly commended in the same category.
Pacific Journalism Online also won the award for best regular publication.
The Pacific theme continued, with the University of Queensland’s East Timor project highly commended in the best student publication category.
Front page of the June 2000 Fiji coup edition of the USP student journalist newspaper Wansolwara.
Lyn Barnier of the University of Newcastle won the best print news story. Losana McGowan of the University of the South Pacific was highly commended in the category. Judge Chris McLeod, editorial development manager at the Herald and Weekly Times, Melbourne, said the student found herself at the centre of a world-class story: “Her report was a very good descriptive piece about a meeting between students and coup leader George Speight, capturing the feelings of the young people whose safety obviously was at risk.”
The University of the South Pacific also featured in the high commendations for the best television news story category, with a piece by student Christine Gounder on Fiji soldiers contracting malaria while on tour of duty in East Timor. Gounder presented a balanced report on a newsworthy issue and explored its implications on a national basis, said judge Katherine Swan, a journalist with the ABC in Melbourne. She awarded first prize to Mia Scacciante from Queensland University of Technology for a story on the republic referendum in Australia.
Swan also judged the award for best television current affairs by an undergraduate student, which went to Tracey Galloway of the University of the Southern Queensland for a report on battery hens.
The first of the Ossie awards to go to Pacific students . . . the 1995 award for best publication went to UPNG’s Uni Tavur, supervised by David Robie.
News director at K Rock, Geelong, Rob McLennan, juged the best radio news story category, won by Michelle Fraser of the University of Queensland. Tamani Nair of the University of the South Pacific, who “handled a risky situation” with his coverage of the Fiji coup’s first day was highly commended.
Dr Mark Pearson, professor of journalism at Bond University, Queensland, writes a regular “Research and Education” column for the Panpa Bulletin (this publication changed its name to The Newspaper Works in 2012).
The 2000 Fiji coup front man George Speight (left), now serving a life sentence in jail for the attempted putsch. In the background is journalist Jo Nata, who was also imprisoned for his role in the coup. Image: Joe Yaya, Pacific Journalism Online/Pacific Journalism Review
By David Robie
Abstract:On 19 May 2000, an insurrection led by failed businessman George Speight and seven renegade members of the élite 1st Meridian Squadron special forces engulfed the Fiji Islands in turmoil for the next three months. Speight and his armed co-conspirators stormed Parliament and seized the Labour-led Mahendra Chaudhry government hostage for 56 days. On Chaudhry’s release from captivity, he partly blamed the media for the overthrow of his government. Some sectors of the media were accused of waging a bitter campaign against the Fiji Labour Party-led administration and its rollback of privatisation. In the early weeks of the insurrection, the media enjoyed an unusually close relationship with Speight and the hostage-takers, raising ethical questions. Dilemmas faced by Fiji and foreign journalists were more complex than during the 1987 military coups. As Fiji faces a fresh general election in August 2001, this article examines the reportage of the Coalition government’s year in office, media issues over coverage of the putsch, and a controversy over the author’s analysis presented at a Journalism Education Association (JEA) conference in Australia.
THE GOVERNMENT of kidnapped Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry, Fiji’s only Indo-Fijian prime minister in thirty years of independence, achieved economic success in its one year in office. Indo-Fijians make up a minority 44 percent of the island nation’s 800,000 population. But on Friday, 19 May 2000, failed businessman and kailoma (part-Fijian) George Speight, along with seven renegade soldiers from the élite 1st Meridian Squadron forces stormed Parliament and took the Chaudhry government hostage in the name of “indigenous Fijian supremacy”. “We’re not going to apologise to anybody and we’re not going to step back, and we’re not going to be daunted by accusations of racism, or one-sidedness,” Speight declared. “At the end of the day, it is about the supreme rights of our indigenous people in Fiji, the desire that it be returned — wholesome and preserved for the future.” (Robie, 2000a: 19)
Many of Speight’s group, like their leader, had dubious reputations:only five days before the coup, Speight appeared in Suva’s High Court on charges of extortion. He also had a grievance against Chaudhry’s government for his dismissal as chief executive from Fiji Hardwood Corporation Ltd, and also from Fiji Pine Ltd. Chiefly associates stood to lose lucrative timber deals if Chaudhry had remained in office.
However, Speight essentially achieved his aims, before releasing his key hostages: purported abrogation of the multiracial 1997 Constitution, written after the coup of 1987 and replacing the 1990 Constitution which enshrined “Fijian paramountcy” (but kept Fiji excluded from the Commonwealth); the de facto resignation of the 80-year-old President, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara; a non-elected indigenous administration; and an amnesty for the kidnappers. (The core group was later charged with treason, a capital offence in Fiji). Meanwhile, the country was plunged into economic chaos.
A year after the attempted coup, a military installed interim régime declared illegal by the Fiji Court of Appeal on 1 March 2001 had been reinstated by President Josefa Iloilo as a caretaker government to steer the country uncertainly towards a general election on August 26; hundreds of impoverished families were “living in atrocious conditions … because of the madcap escapades of George Speight and his goons” (Turaga, 2001); preliminary treason court hearings had been opened against 12 alleged plotters; and Suva newspaper retrospectives were reluctant to look too closely at controversy over the media’s performance during the crisis.
The cover of the “coup coup land: The press and the putsch” article edition of Asia Pacific Media Educator, 2001.
When Chaudhry was released from captivity on July 14, he partly blamed the media for the overthrow of his government (Fiji One News, 2000). Some sectors of the media were alleged to have waged a bitter campaign against the People’s Coalition Government and its rollback of privatisation in the year after the Fiji Labour Party-led coalition had been elected in a landslide victory in May 1999 (Pacific Journalism Review, 2000: 134-164). In the early weeks of the insurrection, the media enjoyed an unusually close relationship with Speight and the hostage-takers, raising ethical questions (see Field; Parkinson; Robie,2000b).
This article examines the media controversy leading up to the putsch, the coverage of the crisis itself and analyses the role of the media as a factor in the upheaval. It also considers political sympathies of journalists, news organisations, and a hostile response from some media industry executives in Fiji to an earlier version of this article delivered at the Journalism Education Association (JEA) conference at Mooloolaba, Queensland, in December.
Fiji Islands and the media
Fiji has a highly developed media industry compared with most other Pacific countries. Until 2000, it had four major monthly or bimonthly news magazine groups, Islands Business International, Pacific Islands Monthly (PIM) (Murdoch), The Review and Fiji First (both locally owned). However, Fiji First faded from the public eye and PIM, the region’s oldest and for many years the most influential magazine, announced its closure a month after the putsch. Islands Business was relaunched as the southern edition of Pacific Magazine in January 2000 after a merger with the Hawai’i-based publisher, Pacific Basin Communications. The three daily newspapers are the Rupert Murdoch-owned Fiji Times (circulation reportedly up to 55,000 during the Fiji crisis but usually around 32,000 week days) and the struggling Fiji government-owned Daily Post, with a third daily, The Sun, which was launched in September 1999. (The Sun is owned by a consortium of Indo-Fijian importers, C J Patel and Co Ltd and Vinod Patel and Co Ltd, and the flagship company of Fiji’s caretaker régime, Fijian Holdings Ltd.) The two smaller dailies do not have independently audited sales, but are both believed to sell around 6000 copies a day. Broadcasters are Fiji Television Ltd, which has one free-to-air channel and two pay channels; the private Communications Fiji Ltd (FM96) radio group; and the state-owned Fiji Broadcasting Corporation. The Daily Post and The Review news magazine share a website, FijiLive, while The Fiji Times is hosted at FM96’s Fiji Village website.
On 15 May 1987, Lieutenant-Colonel Sitiveni Rabuka’s régime ordered both newspapers, The Fiji Times and the original Fiji Sun, to stop publishing indefinitely while armed troops and police occupied the two offices. The next day, May 16, became the first time (apart from once during a hurricane in January 1986) in more than a century that The Fiji Times was not published. The military régime began a purge of political critics and opponents by arresting them without charge. The Fiji Sun, jointly owned by the Hongkong-based Sally Aw Sian publishing empire and New Zealand publisher Philip Harkness, eventually closed
rather than publish under self-censorship restrictions.
There was an exodus of experienced journalists from Fiji after the Rabuka coups. At the start of the Speight attempted coup, the bulk of Fiji journalists were young, relatively untrained and with limited experience. The median age of journalists was 22 with a large bulge in the 21-25 age group. Almost half of Fiji journalists (47 percent) had no professional or educational qualifications at all, and the median experience was 2.5 years. (Robie, 1999a)
Chaudhry and the media
In May 1999, the Fiji Labour Party won the largest electoral mandate since the country became independent in 1970. After more than a decade as an opposition leader and robust trade union leader, and a seemingly good working relationship with journalists, Mahendra Chaudhry got off on the wrong foot with the media industry virtually from the day he took office. The appointment of his son, Rajendra, as his Private Secretary deeply damaged his credibility with the media and the public. Political commentator Jone Dakuvula observes that the Coalition government was on the defensive from day one: “There was no honeymoon period” (Dakuvula, 2000a). But Chaudhry and the People’s Coalition had the most concern over The Fiji Times, arguably the country’s most influential news organisation. Over the next few months, The Fiji Times appeared to wage a campaign against the fledgling government. According to deposed National Planning Minister Dr Ganesh Chand, an economist and former academic at the University of the South Pacific:
One of their lines was that we were not delivering our manifesto immediately; numerous editorials were written on this, and the general tenor of the articles, the locations, the pictures, focus, and most of all, the inaccuracies, all were anti-government. I complained to the [Fiji], Media Council (1) numerous times and judgements against The Fiji Times began coming out. (Chand, 2000.)
According to researcher Nwomye Obini of USP’s Department ofDevelopment Studies, who conducted a content analysis of Fiji Times coverage on the Chaudhry government’s year in office and the coup, the newspaper “bombarded” the prime minister with problems in both editorials and news reports in contrast to previous governments (Obini, 2000).
As the date of the coup approached, the tension grew day by day. Nurses kept making threats, and finally went on strike on May 12, a week before the coup … A rift was even reported between the Commissioner of Police and the Prime Minister. (Ibid.: 15)
Michael Field, a veteran Pacific Affairs reporter for Agence France-Presse news agency, considers several events were covered with a “fixed” approach which encouraged an unfairly negative impression of the Coalition.
One was the infamous tea lady incident which helped create an air, I suppose, of corruption or immorality in the newly elected government. My own view of this was that it was something of a setup job in which the media went along for the ride, and may have, in the longer run, helped to destabilise the government . . . (Field, 2000a)
Field also makes the point that the election result was “remarkably clear but the media, or elements of it, were reluctant to accept it”. Some sections of the media were in his view “arrogantly anti-democratic”. Also, some of the journalistic decision-making was personal. Dakuvula regards The Fiji Times as an example of a newspaper which was “blatantly antagonistic” towards the government:
The agenda of The Fiji Times was to delegitimise the elected government by creating a climate of scandal, loathing and fear so the Fiji Labour Party, at least, would not be able to effectively implement its manifesto. (Dakuvula, 2000b)
Part of the blame lay with the Coalition government itself. There was no evidence that the administration tried to develop a media strategy to establish positive relationships with journalists and use contemporary “spin” techniques to sell its reforms to the public. But sociologist Dr Sitiveni Ratuva argues that the Chaudhry government’s poor relationship with the media was a weakness shared with the previous Rabuka administration.
Both governments had information ministers who did not know how to handle public relations matters, especially how to deal with the media. They were both confrontational. The media’s response also took the same line — confrontational. The media portrayed Rabuka and company as corrupt and inefficient and Chaudhry as arrogant and anti-Fijian. (Ratuva, 2000)
According to Ratuva, the portrayal of Chaudhry basically fed into the rising tide of ethno-nationalist mobilisation. Although the media did not create the conditions for the ethno-nationalist upsurge, it did provide the nationalists with the “legitimacy” to roll on. For media analyst Pramila Devi, this was nothing new. In a paper almost a decadee arlier, analysing the 1992 general election campaign, she had found both The Fiji Times and the Daily Post practised “self-censorship” with a “bias towards a certain ideology”:
It is the same ideology that is shared by the [Great] Council of Chiefs, the military, the Soqosoqo ni Vakavulewa ni Taukei (SVT) and large segments of the ethnic Fijian population. That putting this ideology in practice relegates half of Fiji’s population to a third-class citizenry did not matter. (Devi, 1992: 35)
Decisions by the Chaudhry government not to renew the work permit for reappointed Fiji Times editor-in-chief, Russell Hunter, a former senior journalist on The Australian, and to block Canadian Ken Clark’s work permit after he was appointed chief executive of Fiji Television Ltd — both cases leading to legal action — alienated the media from government (2). Another important factor was the commercial interests of large businesses, major advertisers and corporate opponents of the Coalition government’s efforts at rolling back the privatisation policies adopted by the Rabuka government.
As the Government’s relationship soured further, “payback” time finally came for the press. Chaudhry chose an invitation by the Media Council to launch the Fiji General Media Code of Ethics and Practice on 26 October 1999 to deliver an extraordinary speech damning the Fiji news media generally, singling out three media organisations and prominent individual journalists.
Chaudhry indicated that his government was considering establishing a “swift justice” media tribunal to provide remedies in defamation cases. Moves were also considered to licence foreign-owned media with an annual fee of $20,000. (The Sun, 1999a)
The tribunal proposal, in particular, prompted Pacific Islands News Association (PINA) president William Parkinson to complain: “[Chaudhry’s] attacks against the media were draconian to say the least.We have not had those threats made since the military government in 1987” (Ibid.) Parkinson, managing director of Communications (Fiji) Ltd, owners of FM96 in Fiji and stakeholders in radio stations in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, said he was seriously concerned. Chaudhry questioned whether international media and local media were suffering a “crisis of ethics” and falling credibility.
When day after day a particular reporter writes nothing but anti-government stories with facts manipulated and distorted to discredit and embarrass the government, one is left in little doubt as to what the agenda of the particular reporter is. (Chaudhry, 1999)
Senior political reporter Margaret Wise, who has close links with the party founded by former coup leader and prime minister Sitiveni Rabuka, Soqosoqo Ni Vakavulewa Ni Taukei (SVT), was clearly the journalist Chaudhry had in mind. He named her later in the speech. Wise has been publicly questioned over her style of journalism (see Robie, 1999c: 115), alleged partisan beliefs, accusations of “skirt journalism” tactics, and close ties with Rabuka. So-called skirt journalism was given public prominence by Weekend newspaper publisher Josefa Nata over a series of exposés about women in Rabuka’s life when another prominent journalist was named (3). Hinting that the newspaper could be breaching the Public Order Act, Chaudhry said:
The matter is even more serious than a breach of media ethics and my government is quite concerned at what is happening. Is The Fiji Times carrying the torch for people engaged in seditious activities? The newspaper needs to take a serious look at where it is headed. Is it not fanning the fires of sedition and communalism by giving undue prominence to stories that are really non-stories (Chaudhry, 1999)
Reaction was confined to defensive statements from media industry people, but with no initial publication of the speech. Nor did the media canvas civil society opinions. The government responded to what it called “media hysteria” with eight-page advertisements— including the speech — in both The Sun and Daily Post, costing $16,000 at taxpayers’ expense. (Fiji Sun, 2000). The Fiji Times voluntarily published Chaudhry’s speech after four days and responded with a two-page editorial. Describing the speech as a “rambling diatribe riddled with contradictions, half truths and untruths,” the editorial added:
Chaudhry has been escalating his attacks on the media — in particular the country’s most successful news organisation, The Fiji Times — in an effort to create a climate in which the public would besoftened up for his draconian legislation. (Fiji Times, 1999)
However, the self-interest of media responses did not go unnoticed by the president of the Fiji chapter of Transparency International, Ikbal Jannif: “It seems to me that media wants accountability — for everyone except itself.” (Jannif, 1999: 164).
The coup coverage
After putschist Speight and his gunmen kidnapped the Coalition government, it was astonishing how “captive the journalists were to Speight” (see Robie, 2000b, 2000d; Parkinson; Woodley; Field 2000b). In a sense they were hostages too, even providing a human shield at times of confrontation between the rebel group and the military at
checkpoints: “The media pack offered Speight a profile and credibility — it aided the rebel leader’s propaganda war.”
Even though essentially it was a struggle for power within the indigenous Fijian community, and a conflict between tradition and modernity, the inevitable polarisation of races undermined objectivity. It was apparent to then Daily Post editor Jale Moala that many local reporters had become “confused by the heightened emotion at the time, the use of emotive language and the pleadings of the opposing forces”, as they were drawn into different sides. (Moala, 2000) This, he recalls, was true of both indigenous Fijian and Indo-Fijian reporters.
Fear may have also played a role. As a result, the perpetrators of the terrorist action, led by George Speight, received publicity that at the time seemed to legitimise their actions and their existence. Some argued that the situation may not have deteriorated as quickly as it did if the media had played a more responsible role. But therein lies one of the dilemmas of Pacific Islands political journalism: the extended family system, the tribal and chiefly system and customary obligations may blur the view of the journalist, especially if he or she is indigenous. (Moala, 2001: 125-126)
Moala (Ibid.: 127) points to an example of a Fijian journalist falling foul of a high chief. Josefa Nata, an investigative journalist and journalism trainer who had “cut his teeth” at the original Fiji Sun newspaper, exposed the business dealings of Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, who at the time had been Fiji’s prime minister since independence from Britain in 1970. He was treated as an outcast. Nata later gained notoriety as Speight’s media spin doctor and is now on Nukulau prison isle awaiting trial for treason (4).
For Moala, lack of leadership in some newsrooms was a significant factor. Observed Michael Field: “I left [Fiji, after two months, and as the longest-serving foreign reporter] wondering how much of the coup and its twists and turns was the product of the media itself”. (Field, 2000c) International journalists highlighted the inexperience of some local journalists. According to The Australian’s Brian Woodley:
They got on with reporting the story, a corps of dedicated youngsters with hardly a gram of experience among them. Most are not long out of high school. (Woodley, 2000)
Indeed, there was a steep learning curve for Fiji journalists but with many showing remarkable courage and commitment. It was a harrowing and testing time for the country’s media — the dilemmas were far more complex than during the 1987 coups. Radio Fiji’s general manager (public broadcasting) Francis Herman said: “Our journalists have been threatened, abused, beaten, had stones thrown at them — it goes with the job”. (Herman, 2000) But it was also a time when professionalism needed to rise another notch. Moala considered some reporters stayed too long in the parliamentary complex, “making the outside world believe they were enjoying the hospitality of the terrorists and becoming too familiar with them” (Moala, 2001: 129)
At times, there was strong sympathy among some journalists for the “cause”, even among senior editorial executives. There was tension between the role of “objective” journalist and an instinctive feeling about what should happen in the country.
One of the news organisations that drafted a policy to cope with the crisis was the Daily Post. It covered the putsch with perhaps greater caution than some other local media. In the early stages, the newspaper established guidelines for reporters, photographers and subeditors. Along with the code, it sought greater emphasis on the “effects” of the crisis on the people and the economy and downplayed events inside the parliamentary complex. Guidelines were not formally written, in case they got into the hands of rebels and became a source of threats or reprisals as happened in the trashing of Fiji Television on 28 November 2000 (Robie 2000b: 8). The guidelines:
The newspaper would not use the word “coup” in its coverage.
The events of May 19 would be reported as a kidnapping and hostage crisis; George Speight was to be reported as either the leader of the kidnappers, the gunmen or the hostage takers, but never as “coup leader” to avoid giving him legitimacy in the minds of indigenous Fijians.
The group who stormed Parliament were to be described as “gunmen”, “terrorists” and “kidnappers”.
Use of photographs of George Speight and his supporters inside the parliamentary complex were to be restricted to avoid giving them too much publicity.
George Speight was never to be described as a nationalist working for indigenous Fijian interests; he was to be reported as Suva businessman George Speight, leader of the kidnappers, or leader of the terrorists. (Moala, 2001: 131)
Some news media regularly switched reporters covering events inside the parliamentary complex to prevent them getting too close to the rebels. But in spite of precautions taken by news media groups to defend their integrity — FM96 ran editorial policy notices on air, effectively saying “trust us” — news media credibility was eroded. A senior executive and two news staff of Radio Fiji by the military were detained by the military on October 20 in an attempt to intimidate them into revealing their sources about a major split in the military. Although the highly sensitive news story itself was evidently wellsourced — demonstrated by a mutiny two weeks later on November 2, claiming the lives of eight soldiers — it lacked balance, such as official comment.
Deposed minister Dr Ganesh Chand accused The Fiji Times of destabilising the Coalition government during its one year in office before being ousted by “waging a war” through articles and the courts when the government refused to extend editor-in-chief Russell Hunter’s work permit; losing most complaints lodged by his government with the Fiji Media Council (1); of employing a senior journalist alleged to have close relationships with two prominent political personalities; and of its northern reporter “riding around with rebels” at Labasa on Vanua Levu Island. (Coalition, 2000) Publisher Alan Robinson described the attack as “grossly defamatory”, adding that the allegations “contained not the tiniest grain of truth”. (Fiji Times, 2000a) The following day, The Fiji Times published a front page story, alleging that police were investigating the “stripping” of government-owned furniture and other household goods from Chand’s state home. (Fiji Times, 2000b) Chand filed a defamation writ against the newspaper. (High Court, 2000) and the police investigation was dropped.
In another incident, two journalists based in Labasa were arrested. The Fiji Times and Radio Fiji’s northern correspondents were charged on November 13 with unlawful assembly and unlawful use of a motor vehicle over the seizure of a military barracks by rebels. (Pacific Media Watch, 2000). They were publicly defended by their editors, but it took almost six months before the charges were eventually withdrawn on May 11.
The media response
After this paper was originally presented at the JEA conference on December 6, a PINA Nius Online email report misrepresenting the paper was distributed to Pacific newspapers five days later, stirring up a “political storm” (see Café Pacific, 2001). A campaign of bitter personal attacks against the author followed on the JEANet and Penang Commonwealth editors email listserves over the next two weeks. A two-page article published in Pacific magazine presented the furore as a 12-round “boxing match” fought out on the internet, heavily slanted in favour of The Fiji Times and PINA (Pacific, 2001). The magazine cited a formal complaint by the newspaper’s expatriate publisher and editor-in-chief to the University of the South Pacific, alleging “manufactured ‘evidence’ to establish an erroneous conclusion” (rejected by the university). The magazine did not interview the author or seek a copy of the paper, nor did it canvas views of other media commentators supporting the analysis.
The author replied to the attacks in an interview with Myra Mortensen broadcast on Radio Australia’s Pacific Beat, saying it was an irony that news organisations claiming to support media freedom were trying to gag a journalism academic. (Radio Australia, 2000) New Zealand Herald columnist Gordon McLauchlan wrote that USP had courageously “upheld academic freedom and firmly opposed this deplorable attempt at censorship by journalists” (McLauchlan, 2001) Rejecting The Fiji Times criticisms and protesting against Pacific magazine’s misrepresentations, Association of University of the South Pacific Staff (AUSPS) spokesperson Associate Professor Scott MacWilliam said in a letter to the editor:
AUSPS is concerned that while The Fiji Times and other news organisations purport to support the freedom to express opinions, such opinions are only acceptable if they sustain the same organisations’ views of themselves. (MacWilliam, 2001)
While the author’s main arguments were never published in the Fiji media, other views of foreign journalists who do not live in Fiji but which supported The Fiji Times/PINA perspective were (see The Sun, 2001a, 2001b; Daily Post, 2001). Reprisals were threatened against the journalism programme at USP, but there is no evidence that students suffered from the controversy. USP journalism students had also covered the crisis, winning Ossie Awards for their efforts, and graduates are employed at 15 news organisations across the Pacific (Robie, 2000d)
On the anniversary of the attempted coup, Fiji newspapers were reluctant to debate the shortcomings of crisis coverage. In the only article published examining the media and the coup, The Sun’s Samisoni Pareti cited two diplomats as supporting the view that coverage was “not that bad”. However, Mary-Louise O’Callaghan, writing in The Australian, had earlier questioned whether the local press should bear some of the responsibility for the political turmoil that had engulfed the South Pacific. (O’Callaghan, 2000) Remarked Michael Field in The Fiji Times: “The problem is that in Fiji there are more and more politicians, supported by a cabal in the local media that makes war on other reporters, who say they are not part of this world and wish to be left alone.” (Field, 2001)
The media climate after the general election in May 1999 arguably carried some responsibilty for misconceptions about the People’s Coalition Government in Fiji. No journalist seriously analysed the manifesto of the Fiji Labour Party in order to help public understanding of what the government had pledged to do. It had been the intention of the Coalition government to publish a special supplement in The Fiji Times marking its achievements after one year in office. However, the supplement, dated May 20, the day after the putsch took place, was dumped. The only serious analysis of the deposed government’s performance was written by Fiji Times features editor Bernadette Hussain and published in a USP journalism programme training newspaper (Wansolwara, 2000b) and matched by Agence France-Presse.
Hussain concluded that the Coalition government had been seriously misrepresented. Outlining many of the achievements — such as scholarships and an integrated village development project totalling F$12 million for affirmative action; reducing the cost of living for poor people of all races by removing customs duty and value added tax for essential food items such as rice, flour, cooking oil, tinned fish, powdered milk and tea; and increasing welfare allocations for the disadvantaged from F$3.3 million to $11 million — it was clear that the government was “genuinely concerned about the plight” of ordinary citizens. In the nine months since Hussain’s article, few journalists have attempted to analyse the privatisation policies reasserted by the Qarase government without a mandate. The best éxpose has been a 53-minute video documentary, In the Name of Growth, about the exploitation of indigenous women workers by an indigenous company, the PAFCO
tuna canning plant at Levuka. This was made by filmmaker ‘Atu Emberson-Bain, a deposed Labour senator and former USP academic. (Emberson-Bain, 2001)
Conclusion
Critics regard The Fiji Times, in particular, as having had a hostile editorial stance towards the Chaudhry Government. In spite of claims that it has treated all governments similarly, the newspaper is viewed by critics as antagonistic and arrogant. The focus of news media coverage after the election was to play up conflict. Politics were portrayed as an arena of conflict between the new multiracial reformist government and the conservative indigenous opposition. Coverage did not improve after the Qarase régime consolidated its hold on power. In contrast with media coverage after the 1987 coups, democratic values were not so vigorously defended.
While the news media was fairly diligent, and at times courageous when reporting hard news developments, and the views of prominent politicians, and political parties during the conflict, it was not so effective at covering civil society’s perspectives. Fiji lacks enough critically thinking journalists who can provide in-depth, perceptive and balanced articles and commentaries. Most serious commentaries and analysis during the crisis were provided by non-journalists.
The political scene in Fiji is still highly uncertain and there are confusing scenarios about the result of the forthcoming election, even rumours of a further coup should the Fiji Labour Party retain a majority. It is critical that the Fiji news media maintain independent coverage of political and socio-economic developments. But it is also equally vital that independent journalists, media commentators and academics sustain critical assessments of the role of the media in the wake of the putsch and in future nation-building.
Notes
1. Adjudications were made by the [Fiji] Media Council over three complaints
by Dr Chand against The Fiji Times and two against Fiji Television. In the case of the three complaints against The Fiji Times, No 90 on 11 November 1999 was upheld, No 101 (undated, 2000) partially upheld, and No 102 (undated, 2000) dismissed; however both complaints against Fiji Television (Nos 99 and 100, undated) were upheld.
2. Ken Clark was eventually granted a two-year work permit, although he was on a three-year contract; Russell Hunter returned to Fiji in August 2000 on a further three-year-contract after he appealed to the interim authorities.
3. The term “skirt journalism” in Fiji implies the use of sexual relations to gain privileged information from politicians. For other accounts of examples of alleged skirt journalism, see Jo Nata (1994), “Why we did not publish: The other woman”, The Weekender; “Rabuka and the Reporter,” Pacific Journalism Review (1994), 1 (1) 20-22; Jale Moala (2001). “Political reporting and editorial balance”, p 133, in David Robie (ed.), The Pacific Journalist: A Practical Guide.
4. Jo Nata is also former coordinator of the Fiji Journalism Institute, the training
arm of the Fiji Islands Media Association (FIMA), which has been defunct
since 1998 amid controversy over its donor-provided funds.
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Woodley, Brian (2000), “Courage under fire,” The Weekend Australian, Media section, June 8-14, p 6.
David Robie is senior lecturer and journalism coordinator of the University of the South Pacific, Fiji Islands. He covered the 1987 Fiji coups and his book covering this period was Blood on their Banner: Nationalist Struggles in the South Pacific (Zed Books, London, 1989). This article is republished from Asia Pacific Media Educator research journal. An earlier version was presented at the Journalism Education Association (JEA) conference,Mooloolaba, Queensland, 5-8 December 2000.
Young and Brave: The student coverage of the George Speight coup in May 2000. Image: IPI Global Journalist
By Sean Ransom,compiled from reports by USP journalism coordinator David Robie and USP student journalists Christine Gounder and Tamani Nair
Fiji’s young media corps had a front-row seat to a strange coup in the Pacific Islands in 2000.
On May 19, businessman George Speight led a group of armed rebels into Fiji’s Parliament, took the multi-ethnic government hostage and then waited as the nation’s military and tribal leaders gave into his demands one by one.
The situation ended ended 10 weeks later, on July 26, when Speight and many of his followers were arrested by Fiji’s army.
Rebel leader George Speight (centre) adresses the media on talks with the military at the Fiji Parliament in Suva. A businessman and former government official, Speight had been scheduled for a court hearing the day of the coup to address corruption charges. Image: IPI Global Journalist
The military installed a new civilian government and called for elections in three years.
Covering this insurrection was a test for Fiji’s mostly young corps of journalists, who have an average age of 22, and average only 2.5 years of experience, according to University of the South Pacific journalism coordinator David Robie.
Robie writes that at first, some of them had trouble determining the legality of the would-be regime.
A few showed a too-swift readiness to give legitimacy to, and cozy up with Speight’s rebellion.
Fiji’s print media largely failed to give insightful and critical analysis.
Even when the media performed well, mob violence forced some shops to close their doors.
Ransom, Sean. (2000, Third Quarter). Young and brave: In Pacific island paradise, journalism students cover a strange coup attempt for course credit. IPI Global Journalist.
The Fijian crisis is not about the rights of ordinary people, says veteran Pacific affairs journalist David Robie, it is about ‘a Third World oligarchy which has failed its people’.
ByMark Revington
Sometimes power in Fiji doesn’t come from the barrel of a gun. All it takes is the threat.
During the first 10 days of the Fijian coup, some of the best reporting and analysis carne from the journalism students at the University of the South Pacific (USP), on their Pacific Journalism Online website. On the 11th day, the website was closed down.
The previous night, supporters of George Speight had trashed the studio and offices of Fiji Television, following criticism of Speight during a current-affairs show.
Pacific Journalism Online immediately posted a transcript of the programme, with its caustic criticism and political commentator Jone Dakuvula‘s observation that all the talk about indigenous rights was simply a smokescreen for a naked power grab. And vice-chancellor Esekia Solofa immediately closed it down “as a security measure” after threats were made against the university. (The website, which had been recording around 20,000 hits a day, was eventually put back in cyberspace, hosted by the journalism department of an Australian university.
Right there you had the paradox of coup-coup land (as Australian journalists have dubbed Fiji), encapsulating the two great “isms” — globalism and tribalism — sweeping the post-Cold War world, detailed by American scholar Benjamin Barber in his book Jihad v. McWorld. Look on the business pages of any paper, says Barber, and you would be convinced the world was increasingly united, that borders were increasingly porous. Look only at the front pages and you would be convinced of the opposite; that the world was increasingly riven by fratricide and civil war.
The forces driving the coup were a complex mix, including a class struggle, and a reaction against Mahendra Chaudhry‘s rollback of privatisation and its opportunities for personal power and lots of loot. Some of the businessmen said to be behind the coup, whose names are on lists circulating in Suva and by email through cyberspace, are all in favour of a free flow of capital as long as it ends up in their pockets.
Yet the coup leaders relied for their power base on an insular, tribal intolerance. It was a coup that combined primitive appeal to indigenous Fijians, with the media savvy of glib frontman Speight. And an echo of colonialism from a gun-toting band supposedly seeking to shake off the colonial shackles, (Threats and censorship are traditional weapons of heavy-handed colonial powers such as France to keep their Pacific colonies in line).
Although Speight obviously has little regard for democracy, he knows the value of a soundbite only too well, and used the media. In turn, they offered him a profile and credibility. “They fuelled the crisis and gave Speight a false idea of his importance and support,” says USP journalism coordinator David Robie.
Pulled in at the last minute as the great communicator, Speight communicated so well that there is a theory that he mounted a coup within a coup, using his new media profile to get his own way. “There is a feeling that events didn’t unfold the way some people had planned,” says Robie.
Trouble in cyberspace
Robie, who also coordinates Pacific Media Watch, a group dedicated to examining issues of ethics, censorship, and media freedom in the Pacific, had been through it before. In 1998, ministers in then Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka’s government had tried to close down Robie’s own media and politics website — Café Pacific — and revoke his work permit in what was seen as the first test of the 1997 Constitution’s freedom of expression clause. The prime mover was then Assistant Information Minister Ratu Josefa Dimuri, one of Speight’s key supporters. The politicians backed off after a two-week media controversy.
An award-winning journalist, and author if seven books, New Zealand-born Robie has been an impassioned chronicler of Pacific currents for decades, an interest developed while working as an editor and correspondent for Agence France-Presse news agency in Paris during the early 1970s. After returning to the Pacific in 1977, he began covering Pacific affairs as a freelancer.
Robie witnessed the bloody struggles for independence of the 1980s, and the attempts of independent Pacific nations to chart a nuclear-free course. He reported on the violence between France and Kanak activists in New Caledonia and the massacre of Kanak activists at Hienghène in 1984 that almost provoked a civil war. He was harassed by French secret service agents and arrested at gunpoint by the military in New Caledonia, was on board the Rainbow Warrior when it evacuated irradiated Rongelap Islanders from their atoll, leaving the ship one day before it was sunk in Auckland by French secret service agents. He was in Fiji when Labour Party leader Dr Timoci Bavadra was elected prime minister in 1987, and covered the subsequent coups.
He wrote the book Blood on their Banner, published in 1989, a detailed analysis of the struggle of indigenous people around the Pacific against the remnants of colonialism. The epilogue is just as applicable today in Fiji. “The death of democracy in Fiji was a blow to many nationalists in the South Pacific, putting the struggle of the Kanaks and other liberation movements in jeopardy,” wrote Robie, who recorded how Rabuka went on a big military spend-up, forging closer ties with France and Indonesia, the two nations so adept at using force to put down indigenous populations in their Pacific colonies.
Thirteen years on and not much seems to have changed in Fiji, says Robie.
“Chauvinistic, nationalistic struggles of this kind, based on nepotism, racism, opportunistic crime, opportunities for corruption and suppression of the human rights of others, undermine genuine indigenous struggles such as the Kanak struggle for independence from France in New Caledonia. After all, Fiji has been independent since 1970. In that time it has had indigenous governments except for one month in 1987 when Dr Bavadra was prime minister, and one year in 1999-2000 with Chaudhry.
“What have they done in all this time for the underprivileged indigenous villager? Why are they blaming the Chaudhry government after three decades of failure by Mara and Rabuka and the chiefly oligarchy? This is about a Third World oligarchy which has failed its people.”
In another one of those ironies that constantly emerge, both Dr Bavadra’s government and that of Chaudhry wanted to help Fiji’s poor, often at the expense of cosy business arrangements. Chaudhry may have been too abrasive in his political style, but his heart appeared to be in the right place. His government gave priority to genuine policies to improve health, education and social development.
“It would be fair to say that the Chaudhry government achieved more in one year than the previous Rabuka government achieved in seven years,” says Robie. “The real problem, not the racial stereotyping which Speight insisted upon, was the rollback of privatisation and an emphasis on development for the poor.”
Rabuka’s former Finance Minister Jim Ah Koy, reputedly one of the richest men in Fiji, was hellbent on privatisation in Fiji, and is one of those rumoured to be behind the coup. The rumours were so strong that Ah Koy felt compelled to make a statement, denying any complicity and launching a vicious on Chaudhry. It was run as a full page in all three daily newspapers and read out in full on Fiji Television.
Speight’s dubious business dealings have been well-documented by The Sydney Morning Herald, notably in a piece by Marian Wilkinson headlined “Mahogany Row”, which laid out in detail how Speiught, as chairman of the government-backed Fiji Pine Ltd and the Fiji Hardwood Corporation, stood to make a lot of money from the sale of mahogany forests to US interests. Chaudhry’s government questioned the price Speight was prepared to accept, and the deal, and sacked him.
Speight also appeared to have been involved in pyramid selling in Queensland, where he spent eight years as an insurance and banking broker.
Fiji’s 2000 coup frontman George Speight . . . the forces driving the coup were a complex mix, including a class struggle, and a reaction against Labour prime minister Mahendra Chaudhry’s rollback of privatisation. Image: Joe Yaya/USP Journalism
Paying the price
Fiji, says Robie, is paying the price for years of failure in moral and professional leadership, and failure to develop cohesive, homegrown policies to cope with the impact of globalisation. “Years of corruption, blatant self-interest, short-term band-aid policies, and a neglect of the urdan and rural poor communities since independence have taken their toll. It is rare that politicians with vision and genuine selfless commitment to island development have emerged.”
Where to now? Anyone who knew Chaudhry would not have been taken in by his acceptance of kava and a whale’s tooth — the traditional Fiji peace offering — from his captors, says Robie. There are Australian and New Zealand judges on the bench in Fiji who are reported to be anticipating a challenge to any new government, not only on legal grounds but also on the grounds that the the coup was a violation of the constitutional rights of the Fijian people.
There is an interesting precedent, from Trinidad and Tobago, where the two main ethnic groups are descended from India and Africa. On July 27, 1990, a radical Muslim group took the Prime Minister and Parliament hostage at gunpoint, and stormed the state-run television. Their leader, Imam Yasin Abu Bakr, declared on national television that he had overthrown the government and consigned them to history. Prime Minister Arthur Robinson was shot in the foot during the six days the government was held hostage, then released to add his authority to a settlement for the release of the hostages.
As soon as they were freed, he refused to honour the agreement, saying it had been signed under duress. Over the following months the rebels were arrested and jailed.
After being convicted of treason for leading the 2000 coup, George Speight is currently serving a sentence of life imprisonment in Fiji.
Revington, M. (2000, August 5). Guns and money.NZ Listener, 174(3143): 30-31.
[Profile of David Robie after the George Speight coup in Fiji, May 2000].
Fiji 2000 coup leader George Speight . . . an extraordinarily symbiotic character of the crisis was how the media turned, as the Melbourne Age's Tony Parkinson put it, "a two-bit terrorist into a celebrity". Image: Pacific Journalism Online/USP Journalism
Some reporters and news organisations were too ready to give legitimacy to George Speight’s “two bit” rebellion. The Fiji print media in particular failed to give insightful and critical analysis, writes David Robie.
By David Robie in Suva
It is too easy to generalise about the media or those who work in it, especially over coverage of the Fiji insurrection — the third attempted coup in 13 years.
Criticisms should differentiate between types of reports: contrasting those of the on-the-spot specialist — whether local stringer or regional specialist with long-term knowledge — with those of visiting “crisis” reporters, or “parachute journalists”.
It was astonishing how captive the journalists were to terrorist leader failed businessman George Speight. There was an extraordinary symbiotic relationship between them.
In a sense, the news media were hostages too, even providing a human shield at times of confrontation between the rebel group and the military at checkpoints.
Few journalists in the Fiji media industry, who have a median age of 22 and media experience of 2.5 years, had experienced the two successful military coups in 1987 staged by Sitiveni Rabuka. Nor did many have experience of covering other major political crises.
The media contingent in Fiji was mostly dominated by Australians and New Zealanders. However, there was a liberal sprinkling of Britons, two Japanese crews, a couple of Americans, a correspondent for Le Monde, and a handful of Filipinos.
All three major international newsagencies — Agence France-Presse, Associated Press and Reuters — were reporting too. The media pack offered Speight a profile and credibility — it aided the rebel leader’s propaganda war.
Fuelled the crisis
The media, in fact, fuelled the crisis and gave Speight a false idea about his importance and support — it gave him “political fuel”. Some sectors of the foreign media did not grasp the complexities of the crisis, that this in fact was a power struggle embracing the indigenous Fijian community.
They reported it in terms of racial stereotyping, and assumed that the majority of indigenous Fijians supported the coup perpetrators.
“I don’t know where they got this idea that the majority of Fijians support this coup,” remarked political commentator Jone Dakuvula on the controversial Close-Up programme on Fiji Television. “We only have about a thousand people sitting at Parliament — there are about 400,000 Fijians”.
He added: “It’s very simplistic to use words like ‘majority’ or ‘minority’ because you can’t actually base it on any real knowledge about what people out there in the rural areas feel. Most ordinary people are just watching and observing what’s happening — they’re not active participants in this coup.”
On the other hand, there were many examples of insightful reporting on websites in the so-called “Internet coup” — analysis was generally available on some websites in the mainstream media, certainly in Fiji.
One disturbing feature of Fiji local coverage — and international coverage too — was the failure to fairly report the “civil society” and the range of views outside of the main protaganists.
An international audience could be forgiven for thinking that there were really only two major players in the Fiji crisis — Speight and the military. Not even the deposed elected government (those MPs who were free) was given much media coverage.
Indo-Fijian voices ‘frozen out’
Academic and independent analysis was barely touched. Indo-Fijian voices were largely “frozen out” by the media as if they did not exist.
Speight was the apparent coup leader — a kailoma (mixed race) and a failed businessman, who tore off his balaclava to reveal his identity after the seizure of Parliament on 19 May 2000 in what was billed by supporters and the news media as a “civil coup”.
In fact, his six accomplices were renegade soldiers of the élite Counter Revolutionary Warfare Unit set up by Rabuka to protect himself and any indigenous government and a total of 39 military defectors eventually moved into the parliamentary compound.
By the end of five weeks it had emerged that Speight had been recruited for his exceptional communication skills just hours before the insurrection began. The real power was former British Special Air Services major Ilisoni Ligairi who had been recruited by Rabuka to set up the CRW unit.
In 1987, Rabuka staged both coups for “indigenous Fijian paramountcy”. In 2000, George Speight led the latest putsch for the same reason, arguing that Rabuka had betrayed the cause by supporting the 1997 Constitution which laid the foundation for a multiracial and democratic future for Fiji.
On 27 July 1998, the new Constitution came into force. It included cross-communal voting and established the first Human Rights Commission in the South Pacific. The country officially became known as Fiji Islands, and the people Fiji Islanders.
Mahendra Chaudhry, the country’s first Indo-Fijian prime minister whose Fiji Labour Party won the largest ever mandate in the May election to head a People’s Coalition government, was deposed by Speight, assaulted and threatened with a gun to his head.
Pugnacious political style
With an abrasive, pugnacious political style derived from his trade union background, Chaudhry was hated by some indigenous Fijians even though his administration had arguably done more in office during one year for both the rural and urban poor of both Fijians and Indo-Fijians than previous largely indigenous administrations.
However, the “race card”, as played out by Speight, his supporters and the news media, is “misleading and mischievous”.
George Speight . . . the “race card”, as played out by him, his supporters and the news media, was “misleading and mischievous”. Image: Pacific Journalism Online/USP Journalism
Chaudhry is not the problem, nor are the Indo-Fijian communities. As former University of the South Pacific politics lecturer Teresia Teaiwa adds: Fiji’s problem is Fijian. Increasingly problematic configurations of indigenous leadership in the country.
Fiji has a complex racial and religious mix in its population of about 800,000 with mainly
Christian indigenous Fijians (51 percent) slightly outnumbering Indo-Fijians (44 percent), both Hindu and Muslim, with the rest being mainly European and of mixed-race descent.
During the last coup period, the news media faced far more grave threats to their independence and integrity than during the Speight insurrection. On 14 May 1987, Rabuka assured news media executives that they could rely on a “censorship free press”, but he warned against inflammatory reporting.
Both The Fiji Times and the Fiji Sun bitterly condemned Rabuka and the coup in an editorial next morning.
Rabuka’s regime ordered the two newspapers to stop publishing indefinitely while armed troops and police occupied the two offices. The next day, May 16, became the first time (apart from once during a hurricane in January 1986) in more than a century that The Fiji Times was not published.
Purge of political critics
The military regime began a purge of political critics and opponents by arresting them without charge.
One newspaper, the Fiji Sun, remained defiant, championing democracy and the freedom of the press. Publisher Philip Harkness refused to be intimidated and would not agree to publishing after the coup until freedom was restored. Directors Miles Johnson and Jim Carney were detained without charge when the Fiji Sun was closed after the second coup.
In spite of the two previous coups, covering this insurrection was a testing challenge for Fiji’s mostly young journalists. While the journalists generally came out with flying colours, there were some flaws that ought to be examined.
One was the readiness of some reporters and news organisations to give legitimacy to Speight’s rebellion. Another was the failure of the print media, in spite of the piles of newsprint covering the event, to give insightful and critical analysis.
Reporting of a major crisis of this kind is generally accompanied by analysis in quality overseas media. It is the one advantage that print media has over radio and television — and is essential when news websites are providing this.
Initially, The Fiji Times had no doubt where it stood:
“Outrageous and criminal … We have witnessed how one moment of madness will set this country back by decades. This illegal takeover must end. The democratically elected People’s Coalition has to be restored.”
Sympathised with the rebels The Fiji Times never repeated that message and in fact later in the five weeks appeared to strongly sympathise with the rebels.
The newspapers quickly referred to “self-proclaimed head of state” George Speight when clearly there was only one legitimate President, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara. Likewise, Ratu Timoci Silatolu was being called “interim prime minister”.
Just because the elected government was being held hostage, it did not mean that it was no longer the legal government.
The Fiji Times published the only profile about Speight’s pyramid sales and insurance career — written by a News Ltd journalist. (A Murdoch News Corporation subsidiary owns the Fiji Times.)
There was no in-depth local profile written, something matching a mahogany-and-Speight piece in The Sydney Morning Herald by Marian Wilkinson which exposed how the coup leader stood to gain a financial “killing” from an American timber resource company — until the Chaudhry government was swept to power and trashed the deal.
By day seven, the Fiji Sun was already calling the rebels the “Taukei civilian government”.
Criticism of the media was beginning to emerge. The fact is that some journalists had basked in the glow of coupmaster Speight — something that is hard to imagine in hostage situations in other countries. And this raises ethical questions about how “cosy” the media was with the terrorists.
Said one foreign journalist: “They [rebels] feed us, give us a bathroom and look after us. I like them.”
Fiji Television raid
But that was before the Fiji Television raid on May 28 after which many international journalists fled the country.
The big issue, never satisfactorily resolved, centred on whether journalists should place themselves under Speight’s unpredictable temperament by entering the parliamentary compound.
Other questions centred on the ethics of giving Speight a media platform, at will, to “sound off” only metres from where 30 MPs, some who had been assaulted with a gun put to their head, were being detained incommunicado.
Part of the extraordinarily symbiotic character of the crisis was how the media turned, as the Melbourne Age’s Tony Parkinson put it, “a two-bit terrorist into a celebrity”. More sobering still, it was a tale of how some journalists obsessed with putting themselves in the middle of the story, risked becoming “tools of Speight’s crusade to dismantle Fiji’s democracy”.
Added Parkinson: “We have seen a mass outbreak of this virulent strain of ego-journalism. It is not a pretty sight and it raises an awkward ethical question: to what extent have the visiting media in Suva become unwitting accomplices in George Speight’s brutal game of brinkmanship?
“Virtually from the moment the rebels seized control of Suva’s parliamentary compound, it wanted to be seen to parachute into the danger zone. This meant an obscene rush to get inside the compound and do on-the-spot reports on Speight, the megalomaniac of the moment.
“The media were in hot pursuit of images of masked men with guns, who would do insane things to achieve their aims. It was a heady and addictive brew. Some media organisations overdosed.”
Inside the compound
Reporters (admittedly mostly local) spent nights on end inside the compound trying to explore the innermost thoughts of Speight. They drank kava with his supporters. One journalist shared a pizza with Commander Jimmy, Speight’s brother. He always wore a balaclava so he had to filter his meal through the mask.
The souring of the rebels’ relationship with the media came only after Sydney newspapers ran banner headlines such as The Sydney Morning Herald’s THE MADNESS OF KING GEORGE .
It was thanks to international media that local journalists became more detached in the reporting with the playback from abroad of terms like “coup”, “insurrection” and “rebellion”.
Whatever the pork-and-dalo carnival atmosphere in Parliament grounds, the issues needed to be faced honestly.
This was about an act of terrorism with hostages’ lives under threat. Indigenous chauvinism does not override human rights.
David Robie is senior lecturer and journalism coordinator at the University of the South Pacific. This article was first published by The Independent in New Zealand. It was abridged from a research paper, “Taukei Takeover: The Media Anatomy of a Coup”, that he presented as a keynote speaker at the Australia and New Zealand Communication Association Conference at Ballina, NSW, July 3-5. This paper was later published by Australian Journalism Review (22(2): 1-16).
