Islands could become like Kazakhstan: Critique

Nina Ratulele
A media freedom battle looms in one of the region's most unlikely places for this to be an issue: the peaceful, democratic Cook Islands. But for those now running the main organisations of the country's thriving, lively and free news media, the stakes could be high.

Florence Syme-Buchanan... wants a Media Bill.

Senior representatives from the daily Cook Islands News and multimedia (radio, TV, newspapers, online) Pitt Media Group both say they face renewed efforts to try to muzzle them.

They say this is coming in the form of a behind-the-scenes push to get a Media Bill, already apparently drawn up into draft nine, brought to the country's new Parliament and passed.

They say this surprise push for the bill is coming not from the parliamentarians of the re-elected Democratic Party Government but from a small group of behind-the-scenes advisers and officials.

The bill would set up a government-appointed and run Media Commission with wide ranging powers to regulate broadcast, print and online news media.

The commission would have the power to impose fines of up to NZ$10,000 on the media and to draft codes of conduct they would be required to follow.

Pitt Media Group chief executive Jeane Matenga requested the respected international rights group Article 19 to critique the draft bill. It reported back that the bill's impact on freedom of information and expression in the Cook Islands could be severe.

It could put the Cook Islands in the same category as the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan where there is media repression, Article 19 commented.

Questions that are being asked by Cook Islands media executives include why is such a Media Bill again being pushed in a country with one of the region's best records for media freedom?

Why is it being pushed when earlier concerns about the Pitt Media Group dominating broadcasting have been addressed by more TV and radio licences being issued to other operators?

Why is it being pushed when there is no public agitation for it? Why is it being pushed when there are already well established laws in place people can use if they believe they are being defamed in the media?

Jeane Matenga... requested a critique of the draft Media Bill.

Media executives are convinced the real push for the bill is driven largely by a political adviser who was among a small group of journalists who in the past dominated the local news media. They say this is ex-journalist Florence Syme-Buchanan, who today works for Deputy Prime Minister Terepai Maoate.

They say Syme-Buchanan has clashed regularly with the Pitt Media Group, accusing it of lack of professionalism. There is a belief that those like her who dominated the Cook Islands media in the past have difficulty accepting how the Pitt Media Group in the 1990s took over struggling, debt-ridden government broadcasting services and built them into a successful privatised operation today. 

Syme-Buchanan previously worked with the then prime minister Robert Woonton when he battled the local media in 2004.

The first drafts of the Media Bill were apparently drawn up back in Woonton's time with Syme-Buchanan having a leading role in this.

Woonton is now gone from Cook Islands politics. The current Prime Minister, Jim Marurai, who holds responsibility for broadcasting and media matters, is on record as not supporting the Media Bill.

Marurai is regarded as being open and accessible and supportive of a free media. He has a good personal relationship with all the country's media outlets.

But Maoate's office is, according to Cook Islands media executives, pushing to get broadcasting and media roles transferred to it from Marurai's office.

Media representatives believe Syme-Buchanan is one of the main people behind this push and the Media Bill is one of the reasons. Maoate, a former prime minister, remains the influential leader of the overall Democratic Party despite Marurai being prime minister. Maoate has had his own differences with the media.

As this edition of ISLANDS BUSINESS went to press, Marurai was reported by Cook Islands Television as resisting the pressure to give Maoate the broadcasting and media portfolios.

But if the behind-the-scenes push succeeds and the Media Bill is included in the parliamentary agenda, the Democratic Party Government has been warned it faces an all-out fight.

Pitt Media Group's main weekly newspaper, the Cook Islands Herald, said: "The Pitt Media Group - the largest organisation in the Cook Islands-will never accept the Media Bill because it is the 'bastard by-product' of an unholy alliance between Florence Syme-Buchanan and her former political master Woonton.

Syme-Buchanan herself is on record as saying about the proposed Media Bill: "I've contacted all local media stressing that we have this fantastic opportunity to decide what shape we want our media policy to take, and almost no one has given me feedback.

"As an industry, the media has led calls for reform.

"And yet when it comes time to make any changes, it seems our media organisation can be as deaf and blind as some of our politicians."

The Cook Islands News published a rare editorial in which editor John Woods said: "Somewhere in the past policies of the Democrats is a media bill that aims to legislate for licensing control of media in the Cook Islands.

This strikes against all good, right and enlightened principles of free speech and democracy. It's also contrary to the Official Information Bill which the party is plumping in its new manifesto, seemingly without deep thought about its consequences.

"Such a mish-mash of madness may well be an accident of law grabbing by zealots who want a law to solve their every whim, but it also reveals a kind of power mongering that is insidious."

The question will be how much influence Syme-Buchanan and others like her behind the scenes in the Democratic Party have.

And whether the Democratic Party's newly elected parliamentarians really want a fierce fight with the country's well regarded independent news media. The New Year will tell.