Maravi

Rupiah and the truth

Rupiah and the truth
Written by Editor

It’s good to know that President Rupiah Banda does not favour the idea of statutory regulation of the media. And we agree with his view that the media should regulate themselves in order to enhance professionalism as they endeavour to promote democracy in the country. President Banda also says the media should at all times be fair, objective and report only the truth. This is good and all responsible media houses should endeavour to uphold these professional requirements.

This is what we, together with various stakeholders, have been advocating for a long time. Responsible media will always endeavour to report the truth, to be fair and objective. In short, responsible media will always be professional.

And we hope President Banda is being sincere in making these observations. We say this because our experience with politicians is that they are never sincere in most of their public statements. They usually say things which they think members of the public want to hear at that particular time. They don’t say things out of conviction, out of principle. Most of the time, they make pronouncements for political expedience.

It’s interesting to hear President Banda urging the media to report only the truth. Whilst we know what the truth is, we do not know what truth President Banda is referring to. It appears to us that politicians have their own definition of the truth. The truth is that which they want to hear. Anything short of that are malicious lies against them.

The other day, on Monday to be specific, information minister Lt Gen Ronnie Shikapwasha refused to give an interview to our journalist who phoned him for a reaction to Chisamba MMD member of parliament Moses Muteteka who said President Banda’s statement that he was the only President facing the kind of problems he is facing in the history of the country was a sign of failure in his leadership, Lt Gen Shikapwasha refused to speak to our journalist, saying he first needed to speak to Muteteka because “youThe Post like writing a lot of lies”. Muteteka stood his ground and reiterated his earlier statement. And Lt Gen Shikapwasha never came back to us to apologise for accusing us of being liars.

This is how we are abused every day by the enemies of the truth, the liars. If we quoted Muteteka eulogising President Banda, Lt Gen Shikapwasha would have been the first one to praise The Post.

And Muteteka today is facing disciplinary action from the MMD leadership for advising or objectively criticising President Banda on a number of national issues. MMD spokesperson Benny Tetamashimba is up in arms against Muteteka, accusing him of having insulted President Banda.

But Muteteka is not raising such issues for the first time. We remember that a few months before president Levy Mwanawasa died, Muteteka had issued a press statement which we carried in our newspaper urging some ministers to pull up their socks because they were not performing to our people’s expectations. He stated that Mwanawasa was being overworked because some of his ministers were not effective in their jobs. Muteteka further said such ministers were giving Mwanawasa a bad image and that something needed to be done because the buck stopped at the appointing authority.

Indirectly, Muteteka was questioning why Mwanawasa was keeping dead wood in his Cabinet, or government in general. This he did knowing fully well that Mwanawasa was the appointing authority who used his prerogative to appoint. But the fact that one has the prerogative to appoint does not mean his decisions cannot be questioned or criticised in public interest.

And when Muteteka said this, no one to the best of our recollection, including Tetamashimba, threatened disciplinary action against him for insulting Mwanawasa. What has changed today? Why is it that the words which did not constitute insults against Mwanawasa are today very insulting to President Banda?

This is what we mean when we say politicians have their own definition of the truth. The truth is that which they want to hear, a statement in their favour. And because they cannot achieve this all the time in an environment where vibrant and independent media operate or thrive, these politicians want to control such media through statutory regulation. That is why they are trying to justify their wicked and greedy manoeuvres to regulate the media by claiming that the media are irresponsible and therefore should be checked or controlled.

There is no truth in such cheap claims. This is not to say media operations in Zambia are perfect. We have stated before that like in every profession, there are those who practice journalism with honour and integrity while others don’t. But this should not be used as an excuse to legislate against the media. We have sufficient laws in the country to deal with media houses or journalists who want to libel others with impunity. And these laws are there to protect everyone, journalists included. The editor of this newspaper was libeled by one of the state-owned and government-controlled newspapers and he went to court where he was awarded damages which he has already collected. Today as we write, there are other pending libel cases started by us against other newspapers. This is how it should be. Those who are aggrieved at the unprofessional conduct of the media should seek protection from the law because no one has the right to libel others.

But our politicians do not want to hear this language because their worry does not lie in the libel against them, but the criticism from the independent media which in most cases threatens their grip on power or frustrates their efforts to ascend to power. That is why they are not resting until they regulate the media in the manner they deem fit.

However, it is interesting to see how members from the ruling party and government are slowly withdrawing from this position due to pressure from members of the public who want to protect the media, their voice, from being gagged. We are waiting to see how members of parliament from UPND are going to deal with this matter because they strongly came out exposing themselves as an anti media freedom party.

This is the danger of allowing oneself to be used. UPND accepted to be used by the MMD. They went to Parliament and spoke against media freedom, against The Post to be specific. As these UPND members and others from the opposition took turns denouncing The Post, urging the government to sort us out, the MMD members cheered on and responded that plans were underway to sort out the newspaper.

Today, Lt Gen Shikapwasha and President Banda are saying that they are against the statutory regulation of the media. We don’t know what the UPND, the party that craves the leadership of the country, will now say on this matter

Labels: FREEDOM OF SPEECH, RUPIAH BANDA

posted by MrK @ 9:44 AM