Tonga Govt. Denies Constitutional 'Shut Down' Plan

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TONGA GOVERNMENT SAYS CONSTITUTIONAL CHANGES TO EMBED COMMUNICATIONS ACT
PRINCIPLES

http://www.rnzi.com/cgi-bin/shownews.cgi?storyid=2090547d&caller=newsarchive&day=archive&display=all&showtime=1&showday=2

NUKU'ALOFA (RNZI Online/Pacific Media Watch): The Tonga Government has denied claims that the kingdom's constitution has been amended to shut the Taimi 'o Tonga newspaper out of the country.

The Legislative Assembly voted this week by 16 votes to 11 to change the constitution¹s Clause Seven ‹ a move opponents say will severely restrict freedom of speech.

The publisher of the Taimi 'o Tonga, Kalafi Moala, says the measure will possibly spell the end of the distribution of the paper in the kingdom.

However, the Government spokesperson Eseta Fusitua says the changes merely complete a process begun three years ago with the Communications Act, which was brought in to police the internet, television and radio.

She says the principles needed to be embedded in the constitution.

³Good quality lawmaking should ensure that the principles are in the constitution to enable the specific bills to be made, so really in the case of the media, our principles were not fully embedded and quite clearly we did not have the individual bills to deal with the four mediums.²

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