World press association calls for Bermuda's government to lift ban on local newspaper
|
| Published on Thursday, June 19, 2008 |
Email To Friend Print Version |
By Tricia Henry
Caribbean Net News Staff Reporter
Email: tricia@caribbeannetnews.com
PARIS, France: In a press statement issued on Monday, the World Association of Newspapers (WAN) has released a letter to Bermuda’s Premier, Dr Ewart Brown, calling on the government of that territory to rethink its ban on advertising in Bermuda’s independent daily, The Royal Gazette.
The letter, signed by WAN President, Gavin O’Reilly and President, World Editors Forum (WEF), George Brock, stated that the international press was “seriously concerned that the advertising ban, cancellation of subscriptions and removal of sponsorship from the Royal Gazette may have been politically motivated.”
This letter follows the announcement made by Bermuda’s Minister of Home Affairs, David Burch in March of this year, that his ministry would put a ban on advertising in and subscriptions to The Royal Gazette. This, after he criticised the local newspaper for printing “fiction”.
The position by Burch was soon adopted by the Cabinet Office in Bermuda, which extended a government-wide ban in all advertising in the newspaper.
The government, for its part, has claimed that in the last fiscal year, $800,000 was spent on print media advertising, while $42,000 was spent on newspaper subscriptions alone.
However, the Prime Minister has not provided any further information on the methodology used by Cabinet to cut advertising and subscriptions in the local newspaper.
 |
Bermuda's Premier
Dr Ewart Brown |
But while Brown maintains that the an overall cost-cutting initiative by his government is the official reason for no longer advertising in the newspaper, the editor of The Royal Gazette, Bill Zuill, had a different view and in an editorial published in his newspaper, he revealed that the Prime Minister had indicated to him via a phone conversation that he was “at war” with the Royal Gazette.
Zuill continued: "To be sure, relations between the newspaper and the Government have been poor for some time, in part because the governing party believes, wrongly in our view, that this newspaper and its owners support the Opposition party.”
Zuill concluded that it was the Royal Gazette-hosted, Sunshine Week’s “A Right To Know - Giving Power to the People” initiative that “broke the camel’s back”, with the culminating event being a Wear Yellow Day, in which public were encouraged to dress in that colour to show their support for public access to information.
He said that the declaration of plans for a press council to make the media “more mature”, followed in quick succession by an announcement concerning the ban on The Royal Gazette showed that the government was attempting to muzzle the media and was also in retaliation against the newspaper for hosting its “Right to Know” event.
Bermuda’s Premier also justified its new advertising tactics, saying that advertising spend would now be concentrated in the electronic media, particularly Internet and radio media, as part of its cost-efficiency initiative.
But the letter by WAN stated that the government “has not explained how it arrived at its decision that electronic media are a more effective means of reaching the public”.
“Furthermore,” it adds, “government advertising continues in the island’s other privately owned newspaper, the bi-weekly Bermuda Sun, which has significantly lower readership than the Royal Gazette.”
“While accepting that no government is obliged to advertise in a particular publication, we believe that the government has a responsibility to make sure that its advertisements reach the widest possible audience and provide value for money for the taxpayer,” the authors of the letter stated, adding that the Royal Gazette by far possessed that wide reach more than any other news outlet within Bermuda and as such was a “natural choice for advertising”.
The call by WAN follows a similar one made by the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) in April of this year. In a letter sent to the Prime Minister of Bermuda and signed by Chairman of the IAPA's Committee on Freedom of the Press and Information, Gonzalo Marroquín and IAPA President Earl Maucker, the IAPA expressed their concern at the ban on the local newspaper, and urged the government of that country not use official advertising as a weapon of reprisal against a newspaper.
That letter stated that "discrimination in the placement of advertising severely restricts freedom of the press". Marroquin and Maucker also added that the government "should allocate its resources with complete transparency and employ purely technical criteria".
Both WAN and WEF represent 18,000 publications in over 100 countries around the world, and, like other supporters of freedom of the press, members of both organizations are asking for the government to not to use official advertising as a weapon of reprisal against a newspaper in that country.
The authors of the letter stated: “We respectfully call on you to reconsider the advertising ban on The Royal Gazette and to ensure that advertising is not used as a weapon to pressure independent media with whom the authorities do not agree.” | | | | Reads : 277 |
|
