Newspaper article treasonous says Dominican Minister

Saturday, February 7, 2004

ROSEAU, Dominica: Communications and Works Minister Reginald Austrie on Wednesday night labelled The Sun's back page story ''Eyesore for Sightseers'' as ''tantamount to treason.''

The weekly newspaper reported Monday that the ''Stock Farm garbage dump is like a sore on the face of a beautiful woman. Ugly and out of place.'' 

Austrie believes only someone who is out to do mischief to the country's economy would publish such as item: ''For someone to write that about their country for the whole world to see is tantamount to treason.'' 

The Sun also quoted General Manager of the Dominica Port Authority as saying: ''The cruise ships complain on almost every call. It is disturbing for them because the height at which the vessels are at almost makes up the height of the landfill.''

Bardouille added that captains of the ships berthing at the Woodbridge Bay Port in Roseau have been complaining about the exposed garbage and its stench. 

''It is disturbing for us because our pilots who go onto the ships have to make excuses all the time in order to pacify the captain,'' he noted. .

But Tourism Minister Charles Savarin is not buying that assessment by the newspaper. He called it the worst piece of journalism he has seen and urged the media representative body here the Media Workers of Dominica (MWAD) to investigate the matter.

MWAD's president Dennis Joseph hit back saying the story was accurate and balanced and only goes to show the extent some politicians would go to attack journalists instead of examining the message. 

Joseph reiterated his call to local journalists to band themselves together and beware of people who would vilify them in months leading up to the general election constitutionally due in 2005. 

Both government ministers accused the media house of going to Stock Farm and photographing the garbage dump at an angle the tourists would not have seen from the cruise ship.

The new site for the island's major solid waste disposal has been held up for over a year by forty families squatting on portion of state land at Fond Cole, a low income housing area, a stone throw from the port. 

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