Media Freedom Committee condemns Fiji censorship

A further tightening of media censorship in Fiji is alarming, according to New Zealand's media freedom watchdog.

The Bainimarama regime's issuing of a new media decree yesterday is clearly aimed at totally muzzling an already repressed media, Newspaper Publishers' Association chief executive and NZ Media Freedom Committee secretary Tim Pankhurst said.

It is disturbing that the regime is now moving to cement in place emergency regulations imposed a year ago that have seen censors installed in newsrooms, he said.

Highly oppressive restrictions will be entrenched under a proposed Media Industry Development Decree 2010 that makes military strongmen the arbiters of independent, quality journalism.

It not only targets editors and their journalists. Any members of the public brave enough to express dissenting views are also in line for crippling fines, ill treatment and jail.

Media outlets may be fined up to $500,000 Fiji (about NZ$344,00 ) and individual journalists up to F$100,000 (NZ$69,000) and be jailed for up to five years if they do not comply with the decree's dictates.

Pankhurst said offences included such crimes as criticizing the government and even failing to run bylines. Foreign media ownership was also restricted.

Officers were empowered to enter newsrooms and seize any notes, documents, or equipment.

Soldiers overseeing the media is a characteristic of a dictatorship, Pankhurst said.

There doesn't seem to be any reasoning with an increasingly unsavoury regime that deserves to be isolated and condemned.

Far from restoring democracy, it is heading in the opposite direction.

He said the MFC would continue to offer whatever support it could to colleagues working in increasingly difficult circumstances.

ENDS

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