CPJ’s 7 recommendations to: Revitalise Sri Lanka’s media industry

P resentation by Robert Dietz, Asia Program Coordinator, Committee to Protect Jounalists, on the ‘The Status of Human Rights in Sri Lanka: An Update since the Election of the Sirisena Government’ at the Congressional Caucus on Ethnic and Religious Freedom in Sri Lanka held, at the Capitol Hill, Washington DC on May 20.

Journalists and activists demand justice for Lasantha Wickrematunge’s murder, six years on (freemedia.at)

Along with many others, the Committee to Protect Journalists was pleased to see the transition in Sri Lanka’s Government on January 8. Having found ourselves maintaining a high level of animosity with the previous Government, CPJ welcomes the new administration’s moves to try to end the climate of threat under which journalists and media houses operated.

We are glad to see websites unblocked and the expansion of editorial freedom to State-controlled media outlets. We are glad to see the Government encourage exiled journalist to return home. And we are glad to see the Government take meaningful steps in enacting a Right to Information law.

But there are few observers who feel these gains are vulnerable.

The lack of a clear understanding throughout the Government at all levels, including civilian and military authorities, means that the positive changes that have taken place can easily be reversed.

Some of those concerns lie within Sri Lanka’s political culture. But for the media some of the problems lie within the industry itself.

CPJ continues to receive reports of Local Government’s interference with reporters in the field. While it is commonplace in Tamil areas of the country, it also occurs in other areas too. The central Government’s relatively enlightened attitude toward media has yet to filter down to the lower levels in smaller cities and rural areas.

Sri Lanka finds itself at the end of its internal armed conflict with media that are heavily politicized, and not just along the obvious Sinhalese and Tamil ethnic divide.

Many newspapers and magazines are beholden to powerful political or business interests. Many editors and journalists say that their reporting is constricted by those special interests rather than driven by the professional standards of journalism. Those pressures are exacerbated by years of rancorous political competition.

Younger journalists have never worked under any other conditions or had the proper professional training to help them combat the dysfunction in many Sri Lankan newsrooms. While there is still a tradition of professional journalism in Sri Lanka, over the decades it has become deeply frayed.

Underlying that reality are the deaths and disappearances of Sri Lankan journalists under the previous Government.

They took place with a high degree of impunity. CPJ’s data show that 16 journalists have died for their work since President Rajapaksa first held high office in 2005.

The causes for six others remain unexplained. Police and courts failed to follow through on virtually every death or disappearance that CPJ archived in that period. In the very few cases in which police did get beyond even a perfunctory investigation, the cases became tied up in lower level courts, and never advanced beyond a hearing stage.

Addressing the attacks on journalists with genuine police investigations and courtroom prosecutions would be an important step, but certainly not the only one, in improving the state of media in Sri Lanka.

Practical recommendations

*The government must address the number of unprosecuted deaths of journalists. An independent Commission of Inquiry seems the best tactic. If not, establishing a special office within the Ministry of Justice should be considered.

* While addressing that history of impunity, the Government must also address the current negative attitude toward media at the provincial and village level among Local Government, local police and military, and local power brokers.

* Many of the non-governmental media support organizations promoting freedom of expression issues suffered heavily in the past decade. The Government should find a mechanism to revitalize them while not compromising their independence.

* A Right to Information law was poised to be enacted this year. It would have made access to information a fundamental right for every Sri Lankan. But the Bill was lost in the shuffle in late April, with the passage of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution. The 19th Amendment took away the extreme powers of the President which the previous Government had abrogated to itself. An improved version of the Right To Information law is being developed. Once it is enacted, the current Government must set the historical tone for implementing the act. The concept of the right to information runs counter to the political and bureaucratic culture within Sri Lanka. Enacting the law will not be enough. Implementing it in a dynamic and forceful way will be critical to its long term success. It must not be seen solely as a law for journalists and media institutions, but for the country as a whole.

* The level of professionalism within the press corps must be improved. The existing Sri Lanka Press Institute might be the best institution to address the problem. This should be seen as a priority, perhaps one for international donors to consider.

* Broadcast media form an important arm of the country’s media. Broadcast laws and regulatory agencies remain antiquated. Unlike most modern democracies there are few provisions made for public, commercial and community broadcasters. The broadcast industry stands ready for a large overhaul.

* Sri Lanka’s three State-controlled broadcasters have traditionally been formatted to serve as a propaganda arm for the Government. They should be independently funded so that they can serve the public with editorial independence.

Rather than play the role of the Government’s mouthpiece within Sri Lanka’s often rancorous political discourse, those broadcasters should stand as an example of how journalism should be practiced.

Sri Lanka is on the path to return to a more open democracy. A revitalized media industry will be intrinsic to that growth. The current Government seems committed to creating the space for that re-emergence, but for long term strength the media must build its own institutions to insure that it can fulfill its role in a modern democracy. The international community, which supported Sri Lankan journalists through a very dark decade, should step forward to help them rebuild their media industry.