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Educate instead of legislate The recent criticisms of the Papua New Guinea media particularly from the political circles on how certain issues have been reported are valuable feedback for the media to assess and appraise itself.If the criticisms have merit, the media should correct itself and report issues responsibly. It is often said in PNG and the free world that the media should report responsibly at all times. And it is considered that the media in free societies are “self-regulatory”. Industry-wide and in-house codes of ethics and guidelines and the general laws of a country are expected to ensure this. It is the duty of individual media organisations to abide by them. The free-world is a mixed bag of societies with variant forms of democracy and differing social, economic and cultural backgrounds. It is critical and expected of a media industry in a free country like PNG to be seen to be responsible in deed by understanding these differences and country-specific conditions and allowing the news and current affairs reports to reflect the local conditions. There are also differences within a country and it is incumbent upon media proprietors and their editors and journalists to understand and be well-versed with them. Any departure from appreciating the differences and the codes and guidelines either by intent or as an outward sign of weaknesses in the media, such as the excessive use of the work of a poorly trained and under-paid freelance reporter, and it triggers criticism. The PNG media culture, particularly its approach and treatment of news and current affairs, cannot be a carbon copy of what happens in Australia, New Zealand, the United States and other developed western nations. While the major tenets of freedom of speech and freedom of media are the same, there are marked differences in relation to local conditions in developing countries. Unfortunately, PNG and other developing countries do have their share of news reporting that is out of sync and not reflective of local conditions and replicate the journalism styles of the developed western societies. The developed western nations have well-developed systems with centuries of practice and any sensational reporting or media beat up, can be easily absorbed. The citizens of developed societies are theoretically all educated and are media-savvy and can read and be critical of where a certain media organisation is coming from with a news report that is out of sync. A media savvy-society can read or listen to a news report that is out of sync and place it where it belongs. However, this is not the case in PNG and some developing countries. Any sensational, partisan and confrontational journalism in a fragile and infant democracy of the developing world can and does have varying degrees of repercussions at different levels de- pending on the type of issue or event covered by a news story or a series of them. They may mean the withdrawal of much-needed project finance from an international financier. Such reports may also result in an agitated Member of Parliament rallying colleagues and win vote for a legislate change curtailing the freedom of the media. An insensitive news report may even result in putting various ethnic groups on a nasty confrontation course or engage in payback attacks. It is no excuse for media organisations to seek refuge under the freedom of the media and freedom of expression banners every time someone complains. This column concurs with the recent AusAID-funded State of the Media report that news reports in the PNG are dominantly based on information obtained from one source. In journalism, irrespective of where it is practised in the free world, a news story written from information obtained from one source stands to be accused of being biased irrespective of how factual it is. And further, if the one source is not authentic and has a vendetta that the journalist is not aware, it subjects the news report, the media organisation and the journalist to question. The journalists and editors in the PNG media are all Papua New Guineans. They have a duty to their country, its laws and fellow citizens. Observing the norms of their country and its sensitivities are paramount. This column suggests that the best away for the Government to change poor reporting does not lie in legislation of any shape or form. It lies in better education of journalists and editors, improving employment conditions and making the environment conducive for locals to own media companies. Supporting a journalism and media education that teaches journalists and future editors to be sensitive to the make-up of their country and be conscious of its development aspirations is needed in this country. Such a curriculum is being pursued at Divine Word University. This country does not need journalists who become slaves of newsroom deadlines and servants of six questions referred to in journalism parlance as the “5Ws and 1H” (who, what, where, when, why and how) and aspirations of the media organisation and write from obscurity and out of touch. It needs Papua New Guineans with the brains who can think about the future of their country and well-being of the communities they operate in and write accordingly. However, the present high turnover of reporters from the media leaves any opportunity to sustain good reporting high and dry.
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