Radio Miraya
2725: WORLD PRESS FREEDOM DAY: Free Press in South Sudan
Hello and welcome listeners to Radio Miraya. This is me, Gabriel Shodard and this is Media Forum. And as the world is marking the World Press Freedom Day, we are having this conversation with two guests with me in the studio here. And they are the UK ambassador to Sarcedan, Mr. Guy Warrington. Welcome to Media Forum. Thank you and thank you for inviting me. And indeed congratulations on World Press Freedom Day, because to you and all other journalists. Thank you very much and you are very welcome on this Media Forum. And I also welcome in the studio veteran journalist also practicing and also supporting the media in many ways. Irene Ayer who is the director of the Association for Media Development in Sarcedan. Welcome. Thank you Gabriel and up your World Press Freedom Day to all the journalists and to the members of the public at large. Yes and of course every time we have these discussions about the press freedom day, we ask our guests about the significance of this day. What is the significance of this day for you Ambassador Guy Warrington? So thank you Gabriel. I think press freedom is an essential part of any democracy and the UK of course is a democracy. In the UK we believe that people should be able to discuss and debate issues freely and the press is an incredibly important part of that. We also believe in the UK and it doesn't always suit civil servants like myself, but we believe that people should have the right to challenge us, those of us that are in government. And we believe that those rights should be extended to people throughout the world because the right to discuss things freely, to challenge governments, to have a free press is an essential part of any democracy. And it did not come out of the blue or it has a history, it didn't come as like a granted or given. There was a long history behind that. So I mean free speech is not something that is given. Free speech is a human right and in the UK our history goes back a long time. I mean it's taken thousand years but you know and over the years those rights have become enshrined in UK law. We don't have a constitution but we have a free press and the free press is one of the checks and balances against executive power. And it's an essential, it's one of, there are other ones like free judiciary and it's not the only one but it's an absolutely essential part of any democracy. For Irene, I am this succession for me to develop in the South Sudan. This day it must have a special significance for you. Yeah, to me and to the rest of this fraternity freedom of expression and free press is a pillar of all human rights. You must have freedom to express yourself in order to demand for your other rights. So if you don't have freedom to express yourself then you will not even ask for other rights. So you must have freedom of expression first. So for us this day is very important in a way that we commemorate in order to recognize the work that the media in South Sudan and journalists in particular do every day to inform people. And to also remind ourselves on the need to support freedom of expression, to engage the government, to pay attention to safety of journalists and also to open civic space so that people are able to express themselves. Ambassador Guy Warrington, there's a lot of discussion also in many areas about the importance of free press in a society and in the world. What can you say on that? I think free press is a core element of the peace agreement here. We view press freedom as a core part of civic space so we spend a lot of time talking about how, I mean, take it back a stage. This peace agreement is closely linked to the process of elections. To have elections you have to have civil and political space and we have said that in public as have many other countries many times. What we would like to see, and there's some debate about what the expression of civil and political space means, but from my perspective it's not something that's granted, it's not something that the government grants to people, it's a right that they have. If you are to have a credible electoral process, politicians need to be able to speak freely. Journalists need to be able to report on what they see and there needs to be the ability to express different viewpoints. We will be elaborating more on that. In arenas we are marking this day there is a global theme which is says press for the planet journalism in the face of the environmental crisis. And South Sudan we are not far from the environmental crisis in one way or another. How do you look at this as a South Sudanese also supporting the media houses in this area? This reminds me of what is going on now. Two days ago parliament summoned three ministers including the Minister of Health, Minister of Petroleum and I think of environment because of reports of children born with deformity in the oil producing state. So this is part of the issue of environment and the extractive industry. And for us as the media we have been doing our best in order to bring to the limeline the issues affecting human being which relates to environment. We had a lot of flooding in the past that displays a lot of people. We also had the issue of oil issues. So we do reporting but also we have been having a lot of limitations as the media. We had lack of access to information because for us we don't create the news. We have the news creature those who we talk to to give us information. So as we mark this day and we know that the issue of environment in South Sudan is a big issue that we have to attend to the civic space and access to information has to be opened. And so that journalists help the government in bringing out information that can be reliable and accurate and so that the responsible authority can make decisions. I do believe that the reason why parliament had to summon these ministers it was because they got information and they made decisions out of the inform information that they got. So the media can play a bigger role to educate the public and also to inform governments. So governments should take the media as a partner to development. Because we see that the authorities are not allowing the journalists to access the areas even flood areas, journalists are not allowed even where areas we have suspected cases of pollution, the journalists are not allowed to access and even speak to the people freely. And much of the activism is turned to social media you see photos being shared and people don't say this is me I'm sharing this. So what is your advice to the authorities in this? I am a witness to this because I'm this you know that we do train journalists and also many times we have asked the authority with letters to allow access to those locations to go and cover. We do organize journalists because these are not just anybody these are journalists who are trained and we have not been allowed access. So I think this is very difficult because now if you deny journalists access to the area then you are leaving journalists maybe to go and get information from the second. And maybe go to the social media or go to website of international media and go and you know copy stories from there which is not the case which is not what we want. We want the national journalists to get the first information it should be the international media to copy information and accredit to our local journalists. But as we speak this is not the case we are denied access. We tried also to do advocacy with the relevant offices to you know give accreditation to maybe a few journalists who specialize in covering those areas. Yes that has also not worked so there is a lot of difficulties that we are facing as the media sector is also done and still on this day we call upon you know the government to grant access to journalists. We appreciate the international community and NGOs like the Uniceva have seen sometimes but they facilitate journalists to go and cover you know event like flooding. Yes so we need this we are capable as media institution to send journalists to cover those areas but then we need access. Thanks Irene for that for the UK ambassador as she was speaking of course you might have been making comparisons between the issues of freedom of the press in the UK in your country and here in South Sudan. What can we learn from the UK when it comes to the press freedoms? Well I mean I hesitate to put forward the UK as a perfect country in any regard but there is a huge degree of press freedom in the UK. The only real constraint upon press freedom in the UK are the libel laws which basically means that if you say something that's not true about someone then they could be legal consequences for you but that's a matter for the courts otherwise you know we are operating in a system where you have the right to say anything and you have the right to report on anything and as I say the only real constraint is that it's true. But that is pushing also for like accuracy and trustfulness and all these so you don't go out there in the name of press freedom and say anything you want to say right. So it's pushing for accuracy. Yes indeed accuracy but you know there's a well known expression about press freedom or freedom of expression in the UK which is you know. I may disagree with everything you say but I will dive in the ditch for your right to express that opinion. So you know it's not whether you agree with someone. People should have the right to express any opinion as long as it's not hate speech and you know the constraints are small. I mean we might have elections as they are saying we will have we might have we shall have all these things. So but when we say we have elections in South Sudan and how are free elections or free and fair elections linked or connected to free press. Yes it is it has a lot of link a first of all even the politicians themselves. They need to express themselves to convince voters. They also need the media to pass their information to the wider audience. So it has a lot of link yesterday we were organizing the world press freedom day and then someone told me that a politician was asking why he was not invited for this day. And then one of the organizers asked that do you really want to be invited because we think that you people don't like press freedom. So why do you want to be invited? I said no we want to be invited especially now that we are heading towards election because we need the media to be free so that we are also free. You see so that tells us a lot that we need the media now because the media freedom of expression or freedom of press is a cornerstone of democracy. So people are supposed to express themselves or even the voters yes they they have to express themselves so that they can say that disappointment on on maybe the leaders that have not sub according to their interest. And so the politicians do also need freedom of expression so that they can express themselves or their promises to the voters. So we all need freedom of expression. What I mean the Ambassador Guy Warrington the UK and other countries also have been speaking a lot about the need for the atmosphere conducive atmosphere and other things so that elections in the country can be free and fair. What can you say here in connection as we are celebrating our marking the world press freedom day when it comes to elections in South Sudan. So the UK and others I think we've been very consistent on messaging around elections. Our starting point is that everything we say about elections is driven by a desire for this country to have peace. We believe that fair free credible elections are the best way for that to happen but that doesn't mean that we're in favor of any election we're only in favor of good elections. And there are certain things that need to happen for that to be a good election in this country. You know we for example the unification of armed forces but the connection to the press and the media freedom is that one of the other things that we always talk about is political and civic space that's one side of it. But there is another role that the press would pay in any election which is disseminating information. It can play a role in voter education and it can also play a role in disseminating messages of non-violence and then it can also report on the elections and on the political messages that all the participants. And I stress the word all the participants have in such an election so there is quite a close connection between having a good election and having a free media. Irene you would like to add something on that? Yeah what I want to add is on the preparation of the media for election. What I know is election is not an event. It is a process. Whether we are going to have election this year or not still we will have election. It may be next year when but South Sudan is going to have election. So is the media prepared for election or is the country willing to have an independent media that is going to cover the election from the independent perspective? For me I can say no for now. The media may want to prepare themselves but they also have a lot of challenges because the country itself has challenges. For example the economic challenges which has affected media houses you cannot expect a biobran media in this kind of economic crisis. So if the election is going to take place this year will the media houses be able to facilitate their crew for the coverage of election? Is the media then going to be independent? Is the ground for independent media ready? As I speak now we have sensitive. For the print media we have seen the example where articles are removed from newspapers. And if we are going to have election we will have critical voices. People coming to speak out and we expect a lot of that. So if the articles are going to be removed this way then the public will miss a lot of information. That is one secondly safety of journalists. We have seen in the past last year the previous years journalists were harassed even at parliament. Those are very key institutions. Journalists are supposed to be free by the law to cover political functions. So any political parties that want to organize press conferences in a space like parliament, journalists are supposed to cover. So if this is going to happen then it will affect even the participation of journalists because they will fear for their safety. And media houses will fear for their equipment which are going to be confiscated because we have very few equipment and we don't even want to be confiscated. So those are the issues that I am worried about if the election is going to take place. And a follow up to this Irene from this. The world now is moving towards fighting what is being described as misinformation, disinformation, hate speech and money speech and all these. What is at stake here in South Sudan when it comes to freedom of expression? Now people are expressing themselves but we have seen misinformation and disinformation. Sometimes it comes from leaders themselves. We have bought misinformation online which is on social media and on other platforms that are digital. And then we also have misinformation offline which is roaming around maybe in public bus, in the market. And history tells us that most of the conflict that happens is because of misinformation and disinformation. So efforts and ways we acknowledge institutions like DefiHeds that are trying to combat misinformation. But that is not enough. South Sudanese we have a lot of challenges to do with tribal issues. Yeah, sometimes people divide themselves along tribal lines and then they come and start spreading hate speech and misinformation. That has caused a lot of suffering. I remember one time we were living in a compound together with some of my colleagues. And then one time there was a misinformation that came that by then the former Army Chippo staff, staff ordered for all the authoritarian young men to be killed during that time. And so I remember my colleagues who were young men from we were living in the compound. They could not sleep at night. Yes, they were telling me one maybe we should go to sleep in hotel. I told them maybe that will be also risky because on the way. So and then later it was clarified that that was misinformation. So and you do know that what might have caused that. So misinformation is not good. We should learn from that. But we in the media houses or media industry, we have been working very hard to ensure that at least in the mainstream media, misinformation or hate speech or disinformation is not published or broadcast. So we have the code of conduct and for practice of journalism. And we have been disseminating so that all journalists know that they have the responsibility to only publish accurate information. And this also can be connected to the election when people campaign. When they go around, how do you you have a rival, but you have to respect that rival and speak objectively, not subjectively. And whether you would like to add something on this, what Irene has been saying. Well, I think the bigger. So let me start by saying that one man's misinformation is another man's truth. And you need to be very careful about like suggesting that all you need to do is to declare something to be misinformation. I cannot be said because that is an infringement itself for free speech. So I think there are clear, it is quite clear what hate speech is. We want to avoid sort of ethnically charged speech and politicians need to say that, journalists need to say that, diplomats need to say that. But when it comes to misinformation, inaccurate information, the best way of stopping that is to have a free press. Because if there's a free press, journalists can expose the misinformation. It is only in a controlled environment that misinformation prospers. So I wouldn't want to get in a different definition or discussion about what constitutes misinformation, but I do know that a free press helps combat misinformation. Exactly, exactly, they have a great responsibility. As we are coming to the last minutes of this conversation around the world press freedom day, let me ask Irene about your message to the journalists in South Sudan when it comes to marking the world press freedom day. Because journalism can be exciting, but also it has a huge responsibility in many ways or another. With the constraints and challenges they are facing, what could be your encouraging message to your fellow journalists? My last message to all the journalists is that they should remain professional, because for peace to sustain in this country, the media has a lot of responsibility. And information is power, but then the information has to be correct. And journalists have the responsibility of publishing or broadcasting correct information. And so this lies in their hands and they should keep on training themselves because the media is dynamic. Now we have social media that has come. Still journalists can use the social media in an appropriate way to publish information. And so people will rely on that information. I would like to congratulate them on this day. I know that it is not easy to be a journalist in South Sudan, but they have managed and I am really impressed with what the media in South Sudan is doing, even with the difficult environment that we operate in. Thank you. Thank you Irene for that. Ambassador Guy Warrington. We are speaking in this context of heading towards election at the end of the interim period in South Sudan. And we would like to hear your message through the authorities when it comes to the election and other burning issues at this time. And also another message of the people of South Sudan. So first of all I would just like to join in congratulating journalists here in South Sudan. It is not an easy country to be a journalist. It is actually a dangerous country to be a journalist. We have had an example ourselves of a British journalist called Christopher Allen, who came here and was killed during the conflict. So you need to have courage, you need to have judgement, and you need to persist. So I encourage journalists to look in themselves and see just how important the job that they do is, because that is what we have been discussing here today. In terms of the government, obviously the big issue that we talk about these days is about the elections. So my only, I think the really important thing is that there is still a lot of things, you know, we are meant to be having elections in December 24. There are still a lot of very basic things that need to be decided about those elections. So we encourage the political class, the main political leaders of this country to talk to each other and take decisions on those matters. So that an election, a good election, a credible election can take place. We have touched on some of the things that they need to make progress on. But a lot of these things are just for South Sudan to decide upon. The problem is that we do not see any sign that those decisions are being taken. So we encourage essentially political dialogue. Thank you very much Ambassador Guy Warrington, the UK Ambassador to South Sudan. Thank you very much, Irene. The Director for Association for Media Development in South Sudan. And again, happy Press Freedom Day. Thank you very much. And that is all from me on today's media forum, which makes a pressure down already. And for our listeners outside there, we hope that your journalists will be reporting to you more accurate and factual information when they have more access and better access. Thank you very much for listening.