Dev Nadkarni

WHAT IS COMMON BETWEEN NEW ZEALAND Prime Minister, Helen Clark; Indian Member of Parliament and Speaker of the Lower House, Somnath Chatterjee; and Papua New Guinea Prime Minister, Sir Michael Somare?

As well as being VIPs in their respective spheres of influence, the three are Very Irritated Public persons, thanks to big bad Australia's so-called “non-discriminatory” airport security drills.

In October last year, Clark is said to have been picked out for a screening by security personnel at an Australian airport, even after being told she was the Prime Minister of friendly li'l sis, New Zealand. Though miffed, she was restrained in her public comments about the incident.

In late March this year, Sir Michael was made to go through a similar security drill before he left Brisbane Airport. And in early April, Chatterjee cancelled his trip to attend an important Commonwealth meet in Australia because he was told he and his wife would have to go through the drill.

As this issue went to press, Sir Michael announced he has chosen to forgive and forget the episode, requesting his countrymen to do likewise.

Sir Michael and Chatterjee's pronouncements led to demonstrations in Papua New Guinea and angry letters in the Indian media. Quickly picking up cues from the 'anguished outpourings' of the two leaders, there was a chorus in the two countries of 'national insults', 'racial discrimination' and other pointed remarks smacking of righteous indignation.

Over the weeks, the incident snowballed into a diplomatic brouhaha between Australia and PNG on the one hand, and India on the other. Both countries officially demanded apologies from the Australian government, which it has refused through its diplomatic channels in the two countries. In a more recent development, Sir Michael has refused to accept a sizeable aid package from Australia, pending an apology.

Why are these VIPs so cut to the quick with the Australian administration when the country and its officials were only following laws laid down in the interests of safety and security of not just Australians, but all other nationals flying out of Australia?

“Would the Australians have screened George Bush or Condy Rice even though they say only Queen Elizabeth is exempt from screening?,” screamed an irate letter writer.

Of course, they wouldn't have! And that's not because they are who they are. It's simply because the law says all passengers boarding commercial flights are to be screened.

It just so happens that Bush and Rice fly Airforce One and other United States government jets. If they were to fly commercial flights, they would be subject to the selfsame drills.

After all, would you feel completely reassured flying in a commercial plane if you were told that there is someone in your flight who hasn't been screened-even if that someone is a VIP in his or her pocket borough of influence, wherever that may be?

Why do heads of government and political VIPs (and their wives, as in the case of the Indian), think they should be exempt from basic safety and security procedures devised and implemented in the interests of all including their own countrymen?

Surely, they don't expect to have the privileges of diplomatic immunity, if any, extended to include exemption from security screening? 9/11 put paid to that sort of thing a long time ago! Security must be fail-safe and authorities can never be too careful about it anymore.

These leaders are the proud, highly visible representatives of their respective, vibrant democracies (Chatterjee grandiloquently stated in his protest that he represented the world's biggest of them all).

Why then demand separate standards for themselves? If democracy and good governance mean one law for all, where is the respect for that rule of law? If British First Lady Cherie Blair can be hauled up to a court for travelling without a proper ticket on the London Underground, and if finance minister Gordon Brown is seen awaiting his turn at the check-in counter at Heathrow Airport and then going through security channels like all fellow passengers without a fuss, why not these other public figures?

And what about the things of national importance that may have come up at the Commonwealth meet? What of the unclaimed aid money that is urgently needed to fund national projects? Are these less important than the national honour of the teeming millions that elected them and whom they represent?

In the aftermath of the imbroglio, incensed leaders in Papua New Guinea and India advocated enacting similar laws. The motivation, quite clearly, seemed more to 'teach the Australians a lesson' than any genuine security concerns of the travelling public. The ability to discriminate between personal ego and national pride seems to be an increasingly rare quality in leaders everywhere. Particularly, in situations where avowedly non-discriminatory laws are concerned!


IN PRAISE OF 'DEEP THROAT'

Immortalised by the nickname given to the anonymous, critical source of information that helped expose the Watergate scandal and eventually forced United States President Richard Nixon's exit, 'Deep Throat' is at once the life-blood and bugbear of journalists in the free world. Last month, Fiji got its own 'Deep Throat'.

Having telecast a news clip about the 2000 coup plotters based on a source, Fiji's sole television station had the proverbial midnight knock on its door. The authorities wanted to know the source.

While the station chose to part with the script of the news clip, it refused to divulge the source in accordance with widely followed journalistic ethics. The regional media promptly raised its voice-generating some debate about the grey area between journalistic ethics and legal compulsions (protection of sources by the media has no legal sanction in the justice systems of most egalitarian societies-but the media by virtue of being institutionalised as the Fourth Estate, by and large, has its way).

The original 'Deep Throat' brought the Nixon administration down and made living legends out of journalists Woodward and Bernstein. Of course, Fiji is no United States. But at least at the time of going to press, the Fijian Deep Throat still remains 'Deep Throat'. Happily, that's great news for the region's media freedom!