“Without journalists who will tell it like it is no matter the consequences, the future will continue to be one of alternate facts and manipulated opinions” - Rappler executive editor Glenda Gloria. Image: Asia Pacific Media Network
Asia Media Centre
Journalists and journalism are waging a global struggle for survival and for “truth” against fake news and alternative facts, say two Asia-Pacific media commentators.
“Without journalists who will tell it like it is no matter the consequences, the future will continue to be one of alternate facts and manipulated opinions,” Rappler executive editor Glenda Gloria told about 135 media scholars, journalists and researchers at the opening of the Asian Congress for Media and Communication (ACMC) in Auckland this week.
“As we’ve experienced at Rappler, the battle to save journalism cannot be fought by journalists alone, and cannot be fought from our laptops alone. The battle for truth is a battle we must share — and fight — with other groups and citizens
“Each time our freedoms are threatened, we should have no qualms engaging other democracy front-liners and participating in collective efforts to resist authoritarianism.”
However, she told the virtual conference hosted at Auckland University of Technology (AUT) she believed that journalists had the motivation and enough understanding now to “stop the tide of disinformation” that fueled the spread of authoritarianism.
“In this environment, make no doubt: Journalism is activism,” added the award-winning investigative journalist and author who heads the digital website that has repeatedly angered Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte with its exposés.
Another keynote speaker, Dr David Robie, founding director of the Pacific Media Centre and retired professor of Pacific journalism at AUT, condemned a “surge of global information pollution”.
Disinformation damaging democracy
He outlined how disinformation was damaging democracy and encouraging authoritarianism across the Pacific, singling out Fiji and Papua New Guinea for particular criticism.
Dr Robie cited how authorities in PNG had been forced to abandon mobile health clinics and teams of health workers carrying out covid-19 vaccination and awareness programmes because of the increasingly risky attacks against them.
He said much of the content used by anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists which framed the covid-19 response as a fight between the individual and the allegedly “treacherous” state had been repackaged from US and Australia vested interests.
Dr Robie said universities could do far more in the fight against disinformation and praised initiatives such as the RMIT fact-checking collaboration with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), The Conversation news and academia project, The Juncture journalism school website, and the new Monash University backed 360info wire news service.
“The challenge confronting many communication programmes and journalism schools located in universities or tertiary institutions is what to do about authoritarianism, how to tackle the strain of an ever-changing health and science agenda, the deluge of disinformation and the more rapid than predicted escalation of climate catastrophe,” he said.
Professor David Robie is a New Zealand author, journalist and media educator who has covered the Asia-Pacific region for international media for more than two decades. Image: AUT
“One of the answers is greater specialisation and advanced programmes rather than just relying on generalist strategies and expecting graduates to fit neatly into already configured newsroom boxes.
“The more that universities can do to equip graduates with advanced problem-solving skills, the more adept they will be at developing advanced ways of reporting on the pandemic — and other likely pandemics of the future — contesting the merchants of disinformation and reporting on the climate crisis.”
Dr Robie, who was awarded the 2015 AMIC Asian Communications prize, pioneered several student journalist projects in the region such as intensive coverage of the 2000 Fiji coup and the 2011 Pacific Islands Forum, and more recently the 2016-2018 Bearing Witness and 2020 Climate and Covid project in partnership with Internews.
Journalism Nobel Peace Prize
Glenda Gloria said her entire editorial team had been delighted when their chief executive Maria Ressa was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize – along with Russian editor Dmitry Muratov. Ressa was the first Filipino Nobel laureate and “some of us started calling our office the Nobel newsroom”.
“This immense pride that we feel isn’t just because Maria is our CEO, it is that the prize went to two journalists who have faced the toughest challenges imposed by authoritarian states,” Gloria said.
Filipino-American journalist and author Maria Ressa, co-founder and CEO of Rappler, and the first Filipino Nobel Prize laureate. Image: APR
“More than that, the Nobel prize puts a global spotlight on the extraordinary dangers that we journalists face today.
“To many of us in the Global South, journalism has always been considered a dangerous profession long before media watchdogs started ranking countries around the world according to the freedoms enjoyed by their press.
“And yet, despite all that we have seen and experienced, it’s no exaggeration to say that this is the most challenging period for journalism.
“At stake today is our very existence, our relevance, and our ability to speak truth to power.”
The conference was opened following a traditional mihi by AUT’s acting dean of the Faculty of Design and Communication Technologies, Professor Felix Tan, and ACMC president Professor Azman Azwan Azamati of Malaysia.
Master of ceremonies duties are being shared by AUT’s Khairiah A. Rahman, the chief conference organiser, and Dino Cantal of Trinity University of Asia.
More than 40 media and communication research papers are being presented over three days with the conference ending on Saturday afternoon.
This keynote commentary at the Asian Congress for Media and Communication (ACMC) conference with the theme Change, Adaptation and Culture: Media and Communication in Pandemic Times.
It is addressed through a discussion of three main issues: 1. The Covid-19 Pandemic and how it is being coped with; 2. A parallel Infodemic—a crisis of communication, and the surge of “disinformation” and truth challenges in an “age of hatred and intolerance”; and 3. The global Climate Emergency and the disproportionate impact this is having on the Asia-Pacific region.
Finally the author concludes with an overview of some helpful strategies for communicators and educators from his perspective as a journalist and media academic with a mission.
The keynote speech at the ACMC conference. Video: Café Pacific
Censured or punished? Conflicting reports about the alleged punishment of the two Indonesian Air Force military policemen who stomped on the head of young Papuan Steven Yadohamang at Merauke last week. Image: Yumi Toktok Stret
SPECIAL REPORT: By David Robie
It is open season again for Indonesian trolls targeting Asia Pacific Report and other media with fake news and disinformation dispatches in a crude attempt to gloss over human rights violations.
Just three months ago I wrote about this issue in my “Dear editor” article exposing the disinformation campaign. There was silence for a while but now the fake letters to the editor — and other media outlets — have started again in earnest.
The latest four lengthy letters emailed to APR canvas the following topics — Jakarta’s controversial special autonomy status revised law for Papua, a brutal assault by Indonesian Air Force military policemen on a deaf Papuan man, and a shooting incident allegedly committed by pro-independence rebels — and they appear to have been written from a stock template.
And they all purport to have been written by “Papuan students” or “Papuans”. Are they their real names, and do they even exist?
The latest letter to Asia Pacific Report, dated July 30, was written by a “Paulus Ndiken” who claims:
“I’m a native Papuan currently living in Merauke, Papua, Indonesia. I would like to address your cover story about Indonesia apologises for ‘excessive force’ against deaf Papuan man.
“One day after the incident, the Indonesian Air Force had detained and punished severely 2 members … that had roughly apprehending [sic] Esebius Bapaimu in Merauke, Papua province.”
Dubious reputation
The letter linked to Yumi Toktok Stret, a website with a dubious reputation with accuracy. The report was sketchy and the correct name of the assaulted man, according to reputable news media and Papuan sources, is actually Steven Yadohamang.
“We regret that this kind of rough-housing [sic] happened on the street,” wrote correspondent “Ndiken”, “but we, as Papuans, [are] also glad to know that these perpetrators have received sound punishment …
“Responding to the unfortunate events, the Indonesian netizens had asked for the Indonesian military to immediately take action against the guilty party and were glad that the institution had addressed the people’s concern in a very fast manner.”
A more nuanced and accurate article was written for Asia Pacific Report by Brisbane-based West Papuan academic Yamin Kogoya who compared the “inhumane” assault to the tragic killing of George Floyd in the United States after a white Minneapolis police officer, Derek Chauvin, pressed his knee on Floyd’s neck for nine minutes as he lay face down in the street on 25 May 2020.
Excerpt from one of the spate of questionable letters received by Asia Pacific Report about Papua. Image: Screenshot
How Tabloid Jubi reported the assault on 29 July 2021.
Another letter writer, “Michael Wamebu” … “a native West Papuan living in Merauke”, said on June 29 he would like to bring our attention to West Papua, “which has been painted as if the whole island is in conflict, when actually [there are] only a few small areas [that] were invaded by the Free Papua terrorists that had been exposed to enormous violence.
“I would like to assure the world that there [is] nothing like a full-blown war.”
In the lengthy letter about an incident on June 4 when four civilians were killed in a shooting and two were wounded, “Wamebu” provided alleged details that are likely to have been provided by military sources and at variance with actual news reports at the time.
‘Spike’ over special autonomy
“Yamkon Doleon”, a “student from West Papua and currently studying in Yogyakarta, Indonesia” wrote on July 19 that there had been “a spike in the topic of Papuan special autonomy in social media and also [in] a few international media”.
Launching into a defence of the new Special Autonomy for Papua law for the governance of the two Melanesian provinces of Papua and West Papua for the next two decades – adopted by the House of Representatives in Jakarta last month without consultation with the Papuans, “Doleon” wrote:
“The Special Autonomy itself is a law that guarantees every Papuan to be the leader of their region, to have free education, free health service, and a boost I [the] economy … So which article is not in favour of the people?”
In a comment about the spate of Indonesian troll messages to some media outlets, West Papua Media Alerts said:
“Indonesian intelligence bots, go away. You are being banned and reported and deleted everytime you post, so go away.”
The engaged media advocacy and news service continued: “It is clear we are telling the truth, otherwise you wouldn’t have to spend so much money trying to counter it with a transparent influence exercise. Go home, invaders.
“Friends, there are literally over a hundred sock accounts using random Anglo names, and the same script response. These accounts all come from the BIN-run FirstMedia in Jakarta, and were all created after March 2.
West Papua Media Alerts message to “Indonesian bots”. Image: Screenshot
Report fake accounts
“If you see a comment, please click through on the account name, click the 3 dots and report them as a fake account and going against community standards. We will obviously delete and ban these fake accounts.”
Meanwhile, the London-based Indonesian human rights watchdog Tapol has strongly condemned the two Air Force military policemen who severely beat the disabled man, Steven Yadohamang, in Merauke, Papua, on 27 July 2021.
Video footage which has been widely shared on social media, shows the two personnel beating up a man and crushing his body into the ground and stamping on his head.
Tapol said in a statement: “It is clear from the footage that Yadohamang does not possess the capacity to defend himself against two individuals who appear to be unconcerned with possible consequences.”
A similar incident in Nabire took place the following day, said the statement. A West Papuan man, Nicolas Mote, was suddenly smacked on the head repeatedly during his arrest despite not resisting.
“The incident follows a spate of previous violent incidents committed by the security forces against civilians in West Papua province and is likely to raise further questions about what purpose increasing numbers of military personnel are serving in West Papua,” Tapol said.
Although the Air Force had apologised, it had suggested that the two military policemen, Second Sergeant Dimas Harjanto and Second Private Rian Febrianto, alone should bear responsibility for the incident, said the watchdog.
‘Pattern of violence’
“They, and the Indonesian media, have described the soldiers as ‘rogues’. This assessment is not consistent with a pattern of violence committed against civilians that has been allowed to go unpunished in recent months and years,” Tapol said.
“Indeed, had there not been such indisputable visual evidence of security force violence, it is entirely possible that the incident would not now be subject to further investigation by the authorities.
“But despite facing punishment, the perpetrators are likely to only to receive light sentences because they will be tried in military courts.”
Following the end of the New Order period, civilian politicians were not pushing for military personnel to be tried in civilian courts.
Since 2019, there had been a steady build-up of military and police personnel in the two provinces of Papua and West Papua, said Tapol.
“Deployments and security force operations have increased further since April 2021, when the Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security, Mahfud MD, designated the armed resistance movement, TPNPB, as a ‘terrorist’ group.
“West Papuans and Indonesians have raised concerns that the designation would further stigmatise ordinary West Papuans.
“We would also highlight that in West Papua there are significant underlying problems with institutionalised racism by the authorities.”
Tapol called on President Joko Widodo and the House of Representatives of Indonesia to finish the post-Suharto agenda of reforming the military to combat a culture of impunity over human rights violations in West Papua.
The Facebook prime minister: how Jacinda Ardern became New Zealand’s most successful political influencer ... as reported in The Conversation. Image: Screenshot The Conversation
By David Robie, book chapter in Racism and Politicization
In contrast to disastrous Western exceptionalist trends in Europe and the United States in countering the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, New Zealand was influenced by the success of Asian countries such as Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and Vietnam. New Zealand was conscious of its strategic responsibility for vulnerable Pacific Island nations and launched a bold ‘go hard and go early’ offensive.
After an impressive two-month lockdown period that gave the country time to strengthen its public health defenses, health experts predicted a 97 percent chance of COVID-19 being eliminated. However, there was a relapse in August 2020 when a sudden cluster emerged in the country’s largest city which threatened New Zealand’s COVID-free status. This cluster in turn was contained and eliminated.
But the health issue dominated the economic recovery debate until the general election on October 17 when Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s youngest and most popular political leader, won re-election with a landslide victory. The news media initially played a decisive support role in Ardern’s ‘kindness’ model in rallying a united nation, but later this fragmented.
It really is bizarre. After 26 months of wrangling, stakeholders’ representations and appeals by the Pacific Media Centre participants to Auckland University of Technology management, in the end the innovative unit remains in limbo.
In fact, sadly it seems like a dead end.
In my 28 years as a media educator across four institutions in four countries I have never experienced as something as blatant, destructive and lacking in transparency as this.
Six weeks after I retired as founding director of the centre last December, the PMC office in AUT’s Sir Paul Reeves building was removed by packing up all the Pacific taonga, archives, books and files supporting student projects without consulting the stakeholders.
And then the award-winning staff running the centre on a de facto basis were apparently marginalised.
As former Green Party MP Catherine Delahunty noted: “I am really shocked that a vibrant well developed centre is being treated like this – what is wrong with this institution?”
Academics such as Waikato University’s former associate professor in film and digital studies Geoff Leyland, who produced several landmark research studies on the nature of New Zealand journalism and journalists, complained: “AUT have acted woefully [and the PMC’s heritage] has been treated shamefully.”
Across the Tasman, former Monash University head of journalism and creator of Australia’s first doctorate in journalism programme, Professor Chris Nash, said: “Disgusting … A focus on so-called ‘new’ or digital media is a stalking horse for displacing journalism with apolitical communications studies.” He is author of the challenging What is Journalism? The Art and Politics of a Rupture.
And in the Pacific, the doyen of Polynesian publishing, Tonga’s Kalafi Moala, Taimi ‘o Tonga founder and author of The Kingdom Strikes Back, remarked: “That’s unbelievable. What kind of people are running AUT now? We are still trying to get over the Gestapo-style deportation of the [University of the South Pacific vice-chancellor] from Fiji, and now this? Without any consultation? How shameful!”
Head of the Pacific’s regional journalism programme at the University of the South Pacific, Associate Professor Shailendra Singh, wrote: “It’s a cruel irony that at a time when Pacific journalism is at the crossroads – if not on its knees – and needs to be better understood to be helped and strengthened to face new challenges, specialised Pacific journalism and research programmes in one of the centres of excellence in the region face an uncertain future. It just feels sad and surreal.”
In a perceptive article arguing that the Pacific Media Centre : Te Amokura “must break free to survive”, media analyst Dr Gavin Ellis, a former editor-in-chief of The New Zealand Herald, wrote that it ought to be “re-established as a stand-alone trust. It should continue its original remit … It may be time, however, to find a new university partner. I fear AUT has damaged its associations beyond repair.”
Assistant Vice-Chancellor (Pasifika) Luamanuvao Dame Winnie Laban of Victoria University, who opened the PMC as a cabinet minister a decade earlier in 2007, and director Professor David Robie at the 10th anniversary celebration in 2017. Image: Del Abcede/APR
Opened by then Pacific Affairs Minister Luamanuvao Dame Winnie Laban in October 2007, the centre embarked on a vibrant, high profile campaign over 13 years with award-winning student media productions; projects such as Pacific Media Watch on media freedom and Bearing Witness on climate change; student internships in the Asia-Pacific region stretching from Beijing, China, to Suva, Fiji, Port Vila, Vanuatu, and the Cook Islands; partnerships with the University of the South Pacific and Universitas Gadjah Mada journalism and communication programmes and others; book and journal publications such as the SCOPUS-ranked Pacific Journalism Review and Pacific Journalism Monographs; and quality research (two out of the School of Communication Studies’ three A researchers ranked by the Performance-Based Research Fund [PBRF] in 2018 were based in the centre). (1)
Conflict, Custom & Conscience: Photojournalism and the Pacific Media Centre 2007-2017 . . . published to mark PMC’s 10th anniversary.
It celebrated a decade of achievement in 2017 with the publication of a photojournalism book, Conflict, Custom & Conscience (Marbrook, Abcede, Robertson & Robie) (2), and an international media freedom conference featuring Philippine Centre for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) executive director Malou Mangahas and RNZ Melanesian affairs editor Johnny Blades as the keynotes.
A short video about the Pacific Media Centre made by graduate Sasya Wreksono to mark the 10th anniversary of the centre.
The development communication kaupapa of the centre (established by the faculty as part of the Creative Industries Research Institute based on a Pacific media and politics research cluster in the 2006 PBRF) was: “Informed journalism and media research contributes to economic, political and social development and [the centre] … seeks to stimulate research into contemporary Māori, Pasifika, Asia-Pacific and ethnic/diversity media and culture production.”
The last PMC 2020 Annual Report.
However, the elephant in the room was, as Professor Mark Pearson noted in a comprehensive external review of the centre in 2013, that while the centre had become a research and education “jewel in the AUT crown”, its operations “will not be sustainable beyond the tenure of the current director, Professor David Robie, without institutional, faculty and school commitment”. (3)
Sadly, that long-term commitment was not sustained in spite of various management promises, especially under the current school leadership in the past two years. The centre has been effectively derailed by a series of inept decisions.
We fear for the centre’s future in spite of the hard and dedicated work by the voluntary team at PMC, my former colleagues, over many months.
Consider the following:
In April 2019, a deputation from the centre’s cross-disciplinary advisory board (PMCAB) met the faculty dean, Professor Guy Littlefair, then also acting as head of school (HOS), and then deputy HOS Dr Frances Nelson to discuss the future of the centre following the deputation’s appeal to the vice-chancellor. Representing the centre were me as then director; the chair of the PMC Advisory Board Associate Professor Camille Nakhid – who has helped guide the centre since it began; and senior board member Khairiah Rahman.
We were assured that the PMC would continue as a “named” research centre, but my proposed succession plan which would have guaranteed the recruitment of a high profile Pacific-born media researcher, educator and journalist to continue the work of the centre was ignored.
Instead, I left New Zealand in July 2019 on a half-year research sabbatical in Europe, the Middle East and Asia with the management failing to provide any staff relief for the centre with a view to the future.
In March 2020, after I returned from sabbatical, the PMC provided the head of school with a “voice of the voiceless” vision statement and operations plan for the centre (prepared by advisory board member and Bearing Witness climate project documentary co-leader Jim Marbrook, Khairiah Rahman, A/Professor Camille Nakhid and me). Nothing was done.
Funding was cut for one of the core Pacific Media Centre projects, the award-winning Pacific Media Watch, by a change in policy without consultation. (However, the PMC negotiated in June 2020 a climate and covid project to fill the gap with a US$10,000 international climate change and covid-19 grant by Internews/The Earth Network).
On 18 December 2020 – the day I officially retired – I wrote to vice-chancellor Derek McCormack (after earlier letters in the previous three years), expressing my concern about the future of the centre, saying the situation was “unconscionable and inexplicable”. I never had the courtesy of a reply.
On 16 February 2021, the Pacific Media Centre office was closed on the instructions of the head of school, Dr Rosser Johnson, and emptied of its archives and Pacific taonga without consultation with any staff involved in the centre. This action prompted a “please explain” letter being sent by the Australia Asia Pacific Media Initiative (AAPMI) watchdog to vice-chancellor McCormack. This prompted journalist Michael Field of The Pacific Newsroom to ask: “Who is killing top Pacific journalism – and why?”
It took the school management three months after I retired to come up with a job description and call for expressions of interest in the director’s role on March 19. The EOI criteria had no reference to any specialist knowledge of “Asia-Pacific” research or publication being required.
Some of the PMC team with faculty dean Professor Guy Littlefair (second from left) at a creative showcase in 2019. From left: Del Abcede, Dr David Robie, Dr Philip Cass, Khairiah Rahman and Associate Professor Camille Nakhid. Image: The Junction
When the AAPMI wrote to McCormack, the watchdog’s co-convenor Jemima Garrett, a former Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) Pacific business correspondent and long a leading journalist and trainer in the region, was quite blunt.
But she was also generous about what AUT had contributed to Pacific media and journalism – “at a time when Pacific journalism is under existential threat and Pacific journalism suffer from underfunding” – and called on the university to continue to play a globally pre-eminent role in supporting journalism education, research and collaboration.
“AUT’s Pacific Media Centre (including its associated projects in audio, video and online production and its engagement with Asia and Pacific academic institutions and communities within New Zealand) is the jewel in AUT’s crown,” wrote Garrett.
“As you know, the PMC is the world’s leading Pacific journalism programme [and] is looked to by media professionals and academics from around the world, including in the Pacific and here in Australia. The centre’s research publications and staff and postgraduate student journalism websites (such as PMC Onlinewww.pmc.aut.ac.nz) are valued highly by Australian media professionals and they are frequent contributors.”
The AAPMI thanked the PMC Advisory Board, our volunteers and me for our “pioneering work” in developing the PMC.
“Since Professor Robie’s long expected retirement (at age 75) we are concerned to see the centre without a director and its office relocated without adequate consultation with its stakeholders,” Garrett wrote. “To continue to play its cutting-edge role we believe the Pacific Media Centre needs a world-class director and urge you to advertise the role globally.”
Dr David Robie with books produced at the PMC during his 13-year tenure. Image: Laurens Ikinia/APR
Communication Studies head Dr Rosser Johnson replied on behalf of the vice-chancellor and faculty dean on February 26, saying that “everything that the school is planning will, we believe, enhance its status and increase its visibility”.
Dr Johnson wrote that as part of an office relocation plan involving “16 staff” (none actually directly involved in the PMC), the centre was being relocated from the 10th floor in the Sir Paul Reeves Building (where it had been since 2013, next door to its postgraduate student stakeholders) to the 12th floor (near the administration and staff offices, far from the students and the PMC newsroom).
“This move will mean a one hundred per cent increase in the dedicated PMC office space (from two single offices to two double offices) and guarantees at least as much space for postgraduate students enrolled in research degrees related to Pacific media topics as there was on WG10),” Dr Johnson claimed.
Gone … the Pacific Media Centre office as it was.
“The school staff who moved the items did so under my direction and with the utmost care and professionalism, and the items are safely stored in a locked office in WG12,” wrote Dr Johnson. (There was no inventory drawn up and no consultation with the stakeholders).
“There is no plan to advertise the role of the director of the PMC globally,” continued Dr Johnson.
“Finally,” he said, “let me reassure you that there is no plan to downplay the importance of the Pacific Media Centre.”
Dr Johnson later told the AUT student magazine Debate in its May edition that the PMC office had been relocated for “security reasons” and that the “new leadership” would be announced in April.
Departing Professor David Robie with singing West Papuan students at the final PMC public seminar in December 2020. Image: Del Abcede/APR
That was more than two months ago – and the centre team is still awaiting any word. Kudos to Jim Marbrook, Khairiah Rahman and Camille Nakhid for keeping the fight alive.
Does the Pacific Media Centre still actually exist? And where? Ask the AUT School of Communication Studies. And, if it doesn’t, why not? Let us be honest about the fate of this enterprising journalism research and publication venture.
Dr David Robie is a former head of journalism at the University of Papua New Guinea (1993-1998) and University of the South Pacific (1998-2002), and was founding director of the Pacific Media Centre and the first journalism professor at Auckland University of Technology. He retired from AUT in December 2020 after 18 years at the institution. This article was first published on the author’s blog Café Pacific.
Media freedom means journalism can “shape and spread values, defuse tensions, and counter hate-speech”. Through its capacity to investigate, challenge, and question competing views and opinions with facts and balanced reason, journalism can contribute to positive and sustainable notions of peace.
However, advocating for positive peace in the news media is not just about reducing or eliminating violence or conflict narratives, it is also about offering alternative narratives of hope and action toward peace.
In this case study about West Papua, human rights and peace narratives, the author examines changing strategies over more than half a century by the Melanesian Papuan people to achieve a just, positive, and sustainable peace in the Pacific.
Then head of AUT's School of Communication Studies, Professor Berrin Yanıkkaya; Pacific Media Centre founding director Professor David Robie, and Victoria University's assistant vice-chancellor (Pacific) Luamanuvao Dame Winnie Laban at the launch of Conflict, Custom and Conscience: Photojournalism and the Pacific Media Centre 2007-2017 at the celebration of 10 years of the research centre in October 2017. Image: Spasifik magazine
One of AUT’s Pacific research centres has been without a director since the end of 2020 and a lack of clarity around its future is causing division among staff and supporters. Teuila Fuatai reports for The Spinoff.
Since 2007, AUT’s Pacific Media Centre has built a considerable portfolio and solid reputation for its research and reporting on issues throughout the Asia Pacific region, and as a training ground for Pasifika journalists and academics.
However, a month after veteran Pacific correspondent and researcher Professor David Robie retired as founding director late last year, the centre was packed up without any formal notification or explanation to the remaining AUT staff members associated with it.
The move prompted a social media outcry among supporters and regional journalists, who raised concerns about the centre’s closure and the lack of communication from the university.
A photo of the packed up PMC office sent to Dr David Robie. Image: Café Pacific
However, in response to queries raised by The Spinoff, AUT’s head of the School of Communications Dr Rosser Johnson denied that the PMC was being closed, and reiterated that the contents of the PMC office had been packed up and relocated to a new space beside other key departments elsewhere in the AUT’s communications department.
“I made the decision that we were going to get all our staff of Pacific heritage in the same sort of place, which is on this [12th] floor,” Dr Johnson said. “We’ve got five staff of Pacific heritage – one won’t be moving because he’s in a department that’s on another floor. The rest are going to come up to here in the School of Communications.”
Dr Johnson also said the decision to relocate the PMC from the space it had always occupied was made by the school’s “senior leadership team”.
Staff connected to the PMC were only notified via email after it was done. Senior lecturer and PMC research associate Khairiah Rahman, said it “would’ve been nice” to have been notified about the shift beforehand.
Fuelled concerns
An AUT staff member for 15 years, Rahman’s involvement with the PMC spans nearly a decade and she is also a member of its advisory board. She said the lack of information to staff members like herself had fuelled concerns about the school’s intentions for the PMC’s future.
She said too that the absence of a succession plan for Dr Robie’s replacement prior to his retirement had been particularly worrying.
“Ideally, [the transition] should be seamless. But Professor Robie retired at the end of last year… and we didn’t have a ready successor. I think it’s not a matter of blame but of strategic planning. Was it up to him [Dr Robie] or was it up to the university?
Former PMC designer Del Abcede, former PMC director Professor David Robie and Tagata Pasifika journalist John Pulu. Image: PMC
According to Dr Robie, he had tried several times to engage with the school regarding a transition plan in the past few years, but nothing had happened. Dr Johnson, however, attributed the delays to the impacts of covid-19.
By September last year, a decision had been made by senior leadership staff “that we weren’t going to do anything new before the end of the year,” he said. The process was delayed again by this year’s lockdowns, he added.
An internal advertisement was circulated among AUT staff over the past week seeking “expressions of interest” for the role of PMC director. Those keen to apply had until Friday March 26.
Chair of the PMC’s advisory board and an associate professor at AUT’s School of Social Sciences and Public Policy, Dr Camille Nakhid, said she was disappointed about the lack of information being offered to staff members like herself. Dr Nakhid also believes the role of PMC director should be advertised externally to attract a range of qualified candidates.
What is the direction?
“I understand… we may move things in a different direction, but we do not know what that direction is,” Dr Nakhid said. “We [the board] do wish for a reinvigorated PMC but we are concerned that the direction in which they take it will be to the detriment of the Pacific and Pacific communities and other communities with which the PMC works.”
Dr Robie, who is the founding editor of the research journal Pacific Journalism Review and continues to publish work through various outlets, has been critical of the treatment of the PMC since his departure from AUT. He is adamant those with long-standing links to the centre — like Dr Nakhid and Rahman — not be sidelined in planning for its future.
“On every parameter, the centre’s done incredibly well,” Robie said. “If they follow through with the team they’ve got, I see a great future.”
A multi-disciplinary research unit, the PMC focuses on media and communication narratives in the Asia Pacific region and has a special focus on communities and journalists that have been marginalised or censored by authorities and power structures.
Prior to its move, the centre also housed a range of outlets enabling students and academics to publish and promote their work, including the award winning Pacific Media Watch, which was co-edited by a journalism student every year and helped foster the careers of Pasifika journalist Alistar Kata and RNZ journalist Alex Perrottet.
Dr Robie himself brought considerable experience to the centre, having lived and worked extensively in Papua New Guinea and Fiji, and covered significant human rights and media abuses throughout the region over a 40-year career.
The PMC had been established as an outlet to continue that work and for journalism students to research and cover regional issues largely neglected by New Zealand’s mainstream media, such as West Papuan human rights abuses and electoral corruption in Fiji.
The PMC Project– a video made by Alistar Star, a former PMC student contributing editor on the Pacific Media Watch internship.
Time to reassess
Don Mann, chief executive of the Pacific Media Network (PMN) which runs 531 PI and Niu FM, said the PMC’s current transition period was an opportunity for AUT to assess other ways it could strengthen Pacific media.
“First and foremost, I think to have an organisation that stands for what PMC was originally set up for — a watchdog organisation that protects the freedom of journalism and its role in the democracy — is very worthy,” he said.
“I think the issue which AUT is possibly facing is whether that’s AUT’s role.”
Moving forward, Mann said a focus on developing Pacific people in media and journalism at AUT would be great to see. The underrepresentation of Pacific people who are experts in their communities in media spaces has been a problem for far too long, he said.
“It would be a really opportune time for AUT to look at a centre of excellence for developing Pacific people in broadcasting, new media, journalism and multimedia.
“You look at where our office, Pacific Media Network, is based in Manukau,” Donn said.
“Within walking distance, we’ve got MIT, AUT and Auckland University. The question I’d be asking if I was in AUT is: What’s our plan to engage with diverse communities? What’s our plan to engage with Pasifika communities? What’s our representation at AUT of Pasifika people? I’d be taking this opportunity to look at all those issues.”
Teuila Fuatai is a freelance journalist specialising in social and cultural issues. This article was first published by The Spinoff and the Café Pacific blog, is republished here with the permission of both The Spinoff editor and the author.
None of the claims presented in this article by AUT management about a transition were borne out. The PMC subsequently closed and most of the people involved in the centre later formed an independent non-government organisation to carry on.
Radio 531pi’s Ma’a Brian Sagala talks to the retired founding director of the Pacific Media Centre, Professor David Robie, and Tahitian researcher and advocate Ena Manuireva on the Pacific Days show about uncertainties over the centre’s future.
Pacific Media Network (PMN) podcast, 26 March 2021. Republished with permission.
Former AUT Communication Studies head of school Professor Berrin Yanıkkaya, PMC director Professor David Robie and Victoria University's Assistant Vice-Chancellor (Pasifika) Laumanuvao Winnie Laban at the PMC 10 year anniversary event. Image: Mata Lauano/Spasifik/RNZ Pacific
RNZ Pacific
Auckland University of Technology has denied claims that the Pacific Media Centre is being dumped or sidelined.
The centre’s recently retired director Professor David Robie has raised concern about the way AUT is handling the PMC’s leadership succession, as well as the removal of its physical office without a clear relocation.
But little over a month after Dr Robie retired as its director in December, he was sent photos of the PMC’s office stripped of its theses, books, monographs, research journals, media outputs and other history.
“I was hugely disappointed when I heard about the removal of the office and we were sent photographs by the team back there at AUT,” Dr Robie said.
The PMC Project – a Pacific Media Centre profile. Video: Alistar Kata/PMC
Expressions of interest
But the Head of AUT’s School of Communication Studies, Dr Rosser Johnson, said the faculty had opted for a call for expressions of interest in the leadership role, rather than directly appointing someone.
He said they were looking to make the Pacific Media Centre more visible and more integrated with the life of the faculty.
“We’re moving a few people around. One of the groups of people who are moving around is the PMC,” Dr Johnson explained.
“But it’s moving to space that’s got double the office space and at least double the space for people to work in.”
However, people within the School of Communication who spoke to RNZ Pacific were uncertain about where the PMC office would be, and whether it may simply be a small part of a larger, open space shared with other divisions.
The office of the Pacific Media Centre at Auckland University of Technology was abruptly emptied of its contents in early 2021. Image: RNZ Pacific/Café Pacific
A lack of communication and consultation over the move has drawn condemnation from many regional journalists and researchers.
With almost three months [more than two years] having elapsed since Dr Robie retired, there has been growing suspicion that AUT management will look to change the Pacific focus of the centre.
Bullying rife at AUT
Ena Manuireva, a Tahitian doctoral candidate, said that given the recent Davenport review of the university’s culture which found bullying was rife, the handling of the PMC is shameful.
“It’s good for AUT to have some critical thinking in that department in their university. I’m trying to see what is the gain that they’re trying to have, what will be the outcome,” Manuireva said.
“The outcome would be that AUT would be looked at as a university that’s not open to everyone, especially to the Pacific.”
But Johnson denied that the School of Commuications was looking to change the Centre’s Focus. His characterisation of the matter suggests that the PMC will grow its presence.
“There’s only so much one or two or three people can do. So having more people involved opens up more opportunities for people to link into their communities.
“There’s absolutely no intention at all to limit the Pacific Media Centre.”
The office of the Pacific Media Centre in early February 2021 . . . stripped clean of its research documents, publications, and the Pacific Journalism Review archives. Image: RNZ Pacific/APR
Dr Robie said he would wait and see what transpires, but in his view there was a gap between what was said by AUT and “the reality”.
“The thing is that as a centre, [PMC] had this unique combination of media output as well as the research,” Dr Robie explained.
“I guess what I fear is that there will be a stepping back from the actual media outputs and especially that very broad coverage that we had.”
Dr Johnson said a call for expressions of interest in the Pacific Media Centre leadership role would go out this week.
Café Pacific notes: In spite of the defiant claims by AUT’s School of Communication Studies made in this report, nothing had been done two years after the claims and it is widely accepted that the the Pacific Media Centre – featured as a Creative Commons case study in 2010 – has ceased to exist although its website at the time of closing used to be accessible until recently at http://pmc.aut.ac.nz. Professor David Robie’s own account of the death of a centre was published in Media Asia research journal in September 2022. This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The award-winning USP journalism newspaper Wansolwara ... reporting on the university's own award winners. Image: Wansolwara
By Wanshika Kumar in Suva
The 20th University of the South Pacific Journalism Student Awards in Suva last month were dedicated to retiring Pacific media professor Dr David Robie.
In his remarks to the USP journalism students, the coordinator of the programme, Dr Shailendra Singh, also paid tribute to USP journalism alumni making a “sterling contribution to the region”.
Dr Singh reminded students that they had an important role to play and as journalists to never underestimate their responsibilities to society.
“The region faces many challenges. Climate change is seen as the gravest one of all. But even before climate change we faced problems like corruption and environmental degradation, that have become entrenched,” he said.
“As journalists, it is our responsibility to draw sustained attention to these issues.”
He described Professor Robie, former coordinator of USP Journalism Programme and the founding director of the Pacific Media Centre based at New Zealand’s Auckland University of Technology, as a “champion” of media freedom and media development in the Pacific.
Professor David Robie with his wife, Del Abcede, and Tagata Pasifika broadcaster John Pulu at the Pacific Media Centre’s symposium last month when David and Del were farewelled after 18 years with the university. Image: PMC/John Pulu
“Professor Robie introduced these awards 20 years ago and it is only fitting that on the 20th anniversary of the awards he is honoured for his contribution to media in the region,” he said.
Smaller affair this year
The 20th USP Journalism Student Awards was a much smaller, internal affair due to constraints caused by covid-19.
According to Dr Singh, the awards were the longest running and most consistent journalism awards in the Pacific region.
At the 2018 USP Journalism Student Awards, Professor Robie, invited guest speaker at the time, reflected on being at the university when he set up the awards.
“It is with pride that I can look back at my five years with USP bridging the start of the millennium,” he said.
“Among high points were gaining my doctorate in history/politics at USP — the first journalism educator to do so in the Pacific – and launching these very annual journalism awards, initially with the Storyboard and Tanoa awards and a host of sponsors,” he had said.
“When I look at the outstanding achievements in the years since then, it is with some pleasure.
“And USP should be rightly delighted with one of the major successful journalism programmes of the Asia-Pacific region.”
Ten awards presented
Ten special awards were up for grabs at the 20th USP Journalism Student Awards.
Dr Singh said the event recognised and rewarded students who excelled in their coursework, and this included producing news for print, online and broadcast media.
The awards were organised by the USP Journalism Students Association and USP staff.
Speaking on behalf of the graduating class, Shreya Kumar said the past three years had been a humbling experience.
“We created more memories than we realised which is why I am also filled with anxiety and sadness,” she said.
She urged her peers to persevere in life despite the hardships and challenges.
Earth Journalism News Pacific Partnership coordinator and USP Journalism alumni Donna Hoerder said covid-19 brought about a huge challenge for everyone but as a journalist there was always a story to be told.
“Whatever you publish or broadcast you can always relate it to the current situation,” she said.
“But don’t stop there, be sure to look at how this relates to the region and even at the global level,” she told journalism students.
“Remember your role is that of a watchdog or the fourth estate of power. Use your influence to tell a story that relates to now and one that can be linked to the wider picture not only because that’s how you get more recognition.
“But most importantly because you hold government, civil society and the private sector to account,” she said.
Wanshika Kumar is a reporter with the USP journalism newspaper Wansolwara, which was distributed last week by the Fiji Sun as a liftout. She was also one of the award winners. Asia Pacific Report collaborates with Wansolwara and USP Journalism.
Recipients of the 10 awards:
Most Promising First Year Students Award – Viliame Tawanakoro and Sera Sefeti
Best Radio Student Award – Josefa Babitu
Best Television Student Award – Ioane Asioli
Best Documentary – Group 2: Kim Rabuka, Swastika Singh, Verenaisi Domoika and Ian Chute
Best News Reporting – Wanshika Kumar and Jeshu Lal
Best Sports Reporting – Bulou Naugavule
Best Feature Reporting – Brian Lezutuni (Solomon Islands)
EJN Best Environmental Reporting – Ben Bilua (Solomon Islands), Jared Koli (Solomon Islands), Sera Sefeti and Patrick Lestro
Exemplary Student Award – Dhruvkaran Nand
Most Outstanding Graduating Students – Jared Koli and Shreya Kumar
USP students at the journalism awards night. In the centre is the Tanoa trophy, one of the founding awards, with coordinator Dr Shailendra Singh (behind, black shirt), and other journalism staff Eliki Drugunalevu (bula shirt) and Wansolwara editor-in-chief Geraldine Panapasa on the right. Image: Wansolwara
