Editorial | Protecting a free press
Though elicited at a press conference, this newspaper welcomes Information Minister Dana Morris Dixon’s declaration of the Government’s support for a free and independent media and her implicit condemnation of the political targeting of six of The Gleaner’s senior reporters.
Journalists, Dr Morris Dixon rightly observed at a post-Cabinet press briefing on Wednesday, “do very legitimate work”. They, and the institutions to which they are employed, should not be subjected to invidious attacks.
“The administration is very, very, very sure that we support the media, and will continue to support the media, because we believe that a country that is truly committed to democracy is one that supports the media and does not put up with anything that undermines the role of the media,” the minister said.
Now after Horace Chang’s letter to this paper distancing his party from such behaviour, we look forward to a fulsome declaration of genuine condemnation of the effort to weaken The Gleaner from the governing Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), in furtherance of whose interest the attack was launched by persons unknown. So far!
Jamaicans who believe in democracy, and that fearless and independent media are important guarantors of this form of government, should also demand the same from the JLP.
Indeed, that statement should also encompass a fulsome backing for the role organised/traditional media play in the society, and of their place as part of the infrastructure of democracy.
We also propose that the opposition People’s National Party (PNP) make a similar declaration and that the political ombudsman – now wrongly, and unwieldy, subsumed into the Electoral Commission of Jamaica (ECJ) – adds, as part of the Political Code of Conduct, that the malicious and potentially dangerous targeting of journalists is behaviour from which politicians, political parties, and their adherents, must refrain.
EMBEDDING FREEDOM OF PRESS
We suggest, too, that the constitutional reform discussions, when revived, consider embedding freedom of the press in Jamaica’s Constitution, similar to what obtains in Trinidad and Tobago. But with more.
To be clear, and for an avoidance of doubt, we repeat a position made several times in these columns: this newspaper does not claim the press to be infallible, or that journalists are, or ought to be, beyond reproach or criticism. Indeed, no institution that reports and/or comments on happenings in a society would deem itself so to be. They sometimes – infrequently we hope – make errors.
But unlike the so-called citizen journalists who operate in different spheres, and the unaccountable vigilantes and trolls of social media, traditional media operate with elaborate systems of accountability and checks and balances.
By their training and orientation, reporters are primarily concerned with, and engaged in, the reporting of fact and truth. They also add context to those gleanings to aid the understanding of the facts they deliver.
Editors provide a secondary check on the output of reporters. Editors are concerned with more than style; they are invigilators, ensuring that facts and truth are adhered to, and that the context is correct.
Moreover, a fundamental principle of the traditional/organised press is to admit and correct errors. People who believe they have been wronged can even, at some media outlets, including The Gleaner, appeal to an independent ombudsman.
None of this, we repeat, is, or should be, a shield against legitimate criticism of the press. However, there is a difference between wholesome discourse and justifiable reproach and actions that are threatening and which put people’s lives at risk.
CRUDE ASSAULTS
That latter is what has happened with the six reporters, whose images have been circulated with crude assaults on their characters and professional integrity. An apparently AI generated online video claims them to have political affiliations with the PNP. There is also a corrupt argument that The Gleaner is working for the defeat of the JLP administration.
Two major facts are missed in the vulgarians’ framing of contrived argument: professional media are not the creators of the issues they cover; secondly, governments receive a disproportionate amount of attention from the press, precisely because of that: they are Government. That means they own policy, and with their control of the levers of the State, exercise great power over people’s lives. They have access to taxpayers’ resources.
The upshot: governments command greater scrutiny than other groups.
Which is what a free press in democratic societies is asked to do, in exercising its role as the Fourth Estate.
Society, as part of its unwritten compact, affords media access. The implicit exchange is that the press keeps watch on those who hold power and help in protecting those critical foundations of democracy, which also happens to be the same ones upon which the media erect their superstructure for viability: the right to free speech, and the right to hold and exchange ideas.
The compact is largely one of continued maintenance. The press plays an ongoing, routine role as watchdog.
SOCIETY CALLS BARGAIN
But when those critical foundations upon which the compact rests come under stress and there is a perceived threat to democracy, society calls the bargain. It insists that media increase their decibel and their capacity for reach in protection of the system.
This is a compact that The Gleaner cherishes and performs without fear or favour or partisan concerns.
Citizens have a concomitant stake in protecting freedom of the press and should be vigilant about it.
As the Trinidad and Tobago judge, Frank Seepersad, observed in a 2021 ruling in favour of the Trinidad Express newspaper, whose offices were searched by police trying to find information on their sources for a story: “The media is charged with the unenviable public interest mandate to vigilantly monitor private business, governmental action as well as socio-economic and cultural realities, so as to ensure that relevant and critical information is disseminated to the public at large. Democracy is meaningless if the public is deliberately kept in the dark and a society’s actions and reactions should never be predicated upon misinformation, ignorance, lies, secrecy or deceit. The role of accurate and responsible investigative journalism is therefore vital as unearthed information obtained by such journalists can empower the citizenry and guard against inequity, discrimination, corruption, public malfeasance and maladministration by holding the influential, wealthy and powerful accountable.”
We say: ditto!