Cayman government attempts to censor independent media by financial boycott

Tuesday, February 10, 2004

GEORGE TOWN, Cayman Islands: The Cayman Islands Cabinet has reportedly agreed a directive that would prohibit all Government departments from advertising in Cayman Net News, a sister publication to Caribbean Net News.

The advertising ban came after Leader of Government Business Mr McKeeva Bush publicly complained about the veracity of a front-page story that appeared in the February 2 edition of Cayman Net News concerning the possibility of the cancellation of the constitutional talks scheduled for London last week.

Later that day, during a press conference to announce that the United Democratic Party (UDP) would not attend the talks in London, a decision that effectively cancelled the talks, Mr Bush again publicly chastised Cayman Net News for what he felt was inaccurate reporting, even though the decision then being announced in effect confirmed the accuracy of the report in question.

In Cabinet, however, Mr Bush reportedly indicated the reason for the suspension of advertising in Cayman Net News was that it did not offer sufficient value for the cost, something the newspaper's publisher, Desmond Seales, disputes. "Our ads cost one-third less than the competition, and we offer free inclusion to a worldwide readership on the Internet, which our competitor doesn't," he said.

Mr Seales found irony in the decision. "Last year and the year before, when we were not nearly as well read as we are now, Mr Bush actually instructed Government departments that they must advertise with Cayman Net News, but now that we are reporting news he does not like us to print, he suddenly has a problem and decided to cut off our lifeblood, namely advertising." 

More significantly, Mr Seales thinks this is an attempt by the Government to control the media. "This is a vindictive attempt to silence the independent press," he said. "A country should be very concerned when the government of a supposed democratic society tries to manipulate the flow of information to the public in such a way."

At least one Cabinet member strongly opposed the directive. "How can we take one man's personal vendetta and make it government policy? It's not right," he said

Lending credence to the suggestion that the dispute is personal are the comments Mr Bush made on a local radio talk show last Thursday, during which he seemed to indicate Mr Seales was a member of a British intelligence agency. "I think some journalists here are with MI6," Mr Bush told the show's host.

Later during the same show, while looking through a copy of Cayman Net News, Mr Bush said on the air, "You see this part 'News about the Cayman Islands in the Foreign Press' [a daily column in the newspaper]? That's exactly what I'm talking about with MI6."

Though the Cabinet's actions now make it official that Government departments cannot advertise with Cayman Net News, Mr Seales said that heads of departments and statutory bodies under Mr Bush's ministry have told him since June of last year that they were verbally instructed not to advertise in Cayman Net News.

The Department of Tourism, Cayman Airways, the Port Authority and the Turtle Farm are just some of the entities that have stopped advertising with the newspaper in recent months, Mr Seales said.

With regard to the Turtle Farm, Mr Seales says he was instructed in writing by a local agency to discontinue an ad that was running free of charge in a sister publication Tourist Weekly.

"What sense does that make?" asked Mr Seales, "Here we are trying to help the country, and, out of spite, we're told we can't run a free ad for the Turtle Farm."

Besides banning Government entities from advertising in Cayman Net News, Mr Seales said that businesses in the private sector are also being pressured to discontinue their support of the newspaper. "One notable developer told me that the UDP had pressured him to embargo the newspaper, and their ads were subsequently pulled," he said.

Though Mr Bush has reportedly suggested to other ministries that they not advertise in Cayman Net News, many still were in any case, and the new directive will prevent the booking of new ads in the future.

Mr Bush has become increasingly less tolerant of those opposing his ideas in recent times. Last month, he refused to allow well-respected local attorney Anton Duckworth, who is also chairman of the opposing People's Progressive Movement (PPM), to sit in on a Private Sector Consultative Committee meeting. 

Last November, Mr Bush publicly berated local journalist Olivia Scott in front of over 200 people for asking a tourism-related question during the question and answer portion of a tourism conference. He used Ms Scott's name and returned to the personal rebuke after another panel member had spoken to address the question.

Last July, during a press conference to address a serious crime spree, Mr Bush "went off the record" to rebuke Mr Seales for publishing an editorial concerning the drop off of stay-over tourism in the Cayman Islands, telling him in front of a room full of media members, "you're not helping."

At the Cabinet meeting where the directive to embargo all revenue spending in Cayman Net News was made were the Governor Bruce Dinwiddy, Gilbert McLean, Julianna O'Connor-Connolly, Financial Secretary George McCarthy, Chief Secretary James Ryan, Attorney General Sam Bulgin, and Mr Bush. 

Absent from the meeting and not voting were Dr Frank McField, who was away on Government business, and Roy Bodden.

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