If there is to be spin, let it be for greater good

http://www.kaieteurnewsgy.com/letters.htm

If there is to be spin, let it be for greater good
Kaieteur News, 5 July 2007

Dear Editor,

Lest the Prime Minister be misunderstood or persons choose to
misunderstand and misrepresent him once again, let him say first thing,
that this is not a call for or a programme to remove all TV providers
from the air.

Rather, this is a letter to clear the air of misunderstanding and
misrepresentation in the headline on the front page of SN Wednesday
June 27th, “ Guyana may not be ready for end to radio monopoly - PM”.

Freddie Kissoon and Stella Ramsaroop seemed to have grabbed very
gleefully on to this misleading headline and spun it out in their
columns in Kaieteur News (KN) of 2007-07-01.

The Prime Minister is willing to forgive them even though they know
what they do - they must be struggling to find something to write on
every day but they would have done much injury to the social glue of
our country by building on this distortion.

They could instead be helpful by writing on the many, even small
achievements and contributions of each of us in getting by in serving
each other everyday. They could have taken such a lead from the PM's
commendation of the unexpected, unheralded and innovative way in which
TV was brought to Guyana , within our means.

The air needs to be cleared! We need to be vigilant about facts and
discern spun facts, misunderstood facts and distorted facts. If facts
are to be spun, misunderstood, ignored, let it be for creating greater
harmony.

Firstly, to the headline in SN of 2007-06-27, which draws attention to
SN's report (on their page 10) of the PM's address to the opening of
the Caribbean Broadcasting Workers' Union Workshop, SN's headline was
“Guyana may not be ready for end to radio monopoly” – PM.

By stark contrast, reporting on the same event, the Daily Chronicle's
(DC) headline of the same date was, “Government open an ending radio
monopoly -Acting President” and in Kaieteur News, “Ending radio
monopoly still on Government's agenda.”

Although they listened to the same address, had the same facts, the
headline in SN says something quite different from what DC and KN say!

The Prime Minister did read SN's article but wasn't sure what to make
of it. The first two paragraphs were:-

“Prime Minister Samuel Hinds questioned Guyana 's readiness for a
liberalised radio broadcast sector, a move that President Jagdeo had
promised during the 2006 elections campaign.”

(The PM wondered who in SN wanted to make PM look bad so that he/she
could get close to H.E.!).

“Leaving the question unanswered, Hinds who was performing the duties
of President cited the example of the United Kingdom which, according
to him, took some 53 years to demonopolise radio.”

(The issue was not how long the UK took to demonopolise radio, but when
and what are appropriate social, political, economic conditions for
demonopolising radio.)

The PM found the reports in DC and KN conveyed quite a different story,
which not surprisingly, was the story he intended. See below:-

DC: “At a workshop for broadcasting workers he (PM) reported that
President Bharrat Jagdeo has signaled his intention to have a
[broadcast) law in place ......”

(No one at DC trying to get in close to H.E.!)

KN: “Bringing an end to radio monopoly is still on the front burner of
the Government and may be one of the many changes that would come with
the enactment of broadcast legislation. Prime Minister Samuel
Hinds…made this disclosure during an address…”

(No one at KN trying to get in close to H.E.!)

The SN reporter might have been unsure but the DC and KN reporters were
sure that the PM was reaffirming the government's position to move
deliberately towards enacting a Broadcast Law for the opening up of the
sector.

Turning to the Freddie Kissoon column, “Disintegration or Survival,”
and Stella Says, “Are you ready for this Mr. Hinds' in KN Sunday
Special of 2007-07-01.

The PM would admonish Freddie and Stella that if it is their intention
to be helpful to our society, in presenting balanced views, they should
check sources, multiple sources, as the PM hears professional news
people say.

Certainly, they should have read KN's report (if not DC's. PM hopes
that they are not discriminating against DC) on the same event. The PM
would have gladly sent them a copy of the speech he had prepared and
without any charge for its reproduction!

The PM hesitates to believe that Freddie and Stella have put their need
for articles that generate some controversy and heat, (thus ensuring
readership), before accuracy. The PM hesitates to believe that Freddie
would pretend that he did not read the KN report, for if he did, he
could not have contended in his article of KN of 2007-07-01, that:

“I am contending that the Prime Minister's words on the radio monopoly
were not random emanations but were scripted either inside Freedom
House or the Office of the President. The PM was blunt and harsh. He
told his audience that Guyana may not be ready for an end to radio
monopoly by the State. No Government would issue such a largely foolish
statement.”

Freddie, there was no bluntness or harshness in the PM's presentation.
The PM did not say the largely foolish statement you say that he said
Freddie; you are building your own monster, saying that your monster is
what the Government is and then beating it up, and what for Freddie?
The Prime Minister's words were his own Freddie, not scripted, neither
in Freedom House (a good place to be, where all are welcomed) nor in
the Office of the President (no less a good place to be). Those words
which the PM spoke and in the particular context were indeed not random
emanations but were intended to help take Guyanese and Guyana to a
greater understanding of the issues and a satisfying opening up of the
Broadcast Sector.

The PM in this regard spoke of the United Kingdom , where state
monopoly in broadcast, both radio and TV - the BBC - was well ensconced
and well defended. The PM talked about the brave, courageous, venture
some souls who in 1969 set up private radio stations on ships just
outside the UK, proclaimed 12-mile territorial limit at sea, and how
nevertheless the UK found excuses to go after them, and go after these
private entrepreneurs the Royal Navy did, until a law was enacted in
the UK in 1973 opening up their Broadcast Sector in a step by step,
controlled way.

The PM pointed out that obviously a significant change of view had to
have taken place within the UK Government and people since in 1969 they
still held dearly to the monopoly of the state in broadcasting and in
1973 they relented.

The Prime Minister then asked what considerations and judgements -
historical, social, political, economic - would have been pondered in
this change in policy in the UK .

The PM further asked the audience to ponder the similar considerations
for Guyana in 2007, and judge whether the relevant conditions in Guyana
in 2007 are close enough to conditions in the UK in 1973.

The SN reporter missed or chose to miss completely the gist of this
presentation. The Prime Minister did not say “the United Kingdom .....
took 53 years to demonopolise radio” - this was not the gist of the
argument. It was one of the readiness and preparation of the British
society in 1973 for the opening up of broadcasting.

And this issue of readiness and preparation for a change is not a
trivial matter. The PM thinks that Freddie (he is not sure about
Stella) could have sensed a challenge for a substantial dissertation on
this subject.

Freddie could have reflected on the reported role of radio in
polarizing, organising and coordinating the bloody genocide of Rwanda .
Freddie could even have discussed the uncontrolled glasnost and
perestroika that brought the disastrous, punishing collapse of the USSR
and the bitter experiences of hundreds of millions of its peoples, and
compare it to the more controlled opening in China which was threatened
by developments in Tiananmen Square .

The PM has no doubt that neither Freddie nor Stella would want anything
like Rwanda in Guyana but the PM often wonders about the foolishness
they propound.

The PM joins Stella in her wish that she was living in Guyana ,
particularly from mid-1997 to mid-2002.

Stella then would have sensed the polarization occurring amongst our
peoples around Channel 9 and around Channels 65 and 69, which led H.E.
and the late Mr Desmond Hoyte to freeze the broadcast sector until a
Broadcast Law would have been enacted, and to set up in the interim the
ACB to rule on matters of content and in which content matters, the
Minister would be a creature of the ACB.

The PM wants to believe that if Stella was in Guyana and had gone to
hear his address, she would have caught fire in his resounding praise
of the personalities who got TV going in Guyana , escaping the old
vision of a mini-BBC. Tony, borrowing a GTC tropo dish, everybody
trying to beat his box; good citizen Rex offering free service,
focusing on sports; CNS improvising with a wallaba electricity pole for
the base of his aerial, his initial transmissions from his drawing room
as his studio is reminiscent of Logie Baird, the UK proclaimed inventor
of television and his first transmissions from his drawing room to his
library!

We really have now, in Guyana , TV with Guyanese features. In which
other city would you have 15 over-the-air TV stations accessible, and
on channels that elsewhere are not allowed over the air? We may yet
find ourselves in the lead in community TV where there are
announcements of births and deaths!

The PM called on his audience to feel the excitement, the satisfaction
of the achievements, of adapting, innovating, bridging, sensing and
meeting our needs in ways that we could afford.

Freddie's and Stella's daily columns may not be so demanding after all,
if they could get beyond seeking even contrived opportunities to gripe.
Remember SN in the late 1980s used to carry a column on a small
business person.

There is much that we in Guyana do, and do well, within our
limitations, that you can sing about and yes, critique so as to point
to the next steps for improvement.

PM, from time to time, does sing the achievements of our people who
provide service to us, and make a living at the same time, in the
presence of adverse circumstances - our suitcase traders of two decades
ago; our minibus operators; our power saw lumber operators; and our
land dredging miners.

We often say, let us have the facts, but as one of the PM's mentors has
remarked, “facts by themselves say nothing”.

PM will continue to affirm this Government's intention to open up
broadcasting, and to encourage our people to save, to work, to build,
to find jobs in serving each other, meeting each other's needs within
available means, even though SN, Freddie, and Stella have shown how
they can turn things upside down by spinning facts; misunderstanding
facts; misreporting facts and distorting facts.

From the Office of the Prime Minister