The recruitment of journalists for both open and covert political
work in the Caribbean is a longstanding practice that has spanned many years. No
current political administration should feel overly targeted or victimised by
the claim that they engage in this practice, either openly or quietly. They’ve
all done it.
For journalists, the lure of better salaries, a sense of job
security spanning at least a five-year political term and work in an area about
which they are acutely aware are attractions that too often prove irresistible.
The subject was debated at the last International Press
Institute (IPI) World Congress, hosted in Trinidad, without clear direction in
the end, on the feasibility of moving freely from one such vocation and back.
But it has happened in the past and will continue to happen.
If change comes at the end of a five-year term, journalists often swap places
between the newsroom and the state house.
What is unacceptable, though, is the fact that some working
journalists, broadcasters and media functionaries are known or suspected to be,
with some degree of certainty, to be on discreet political payrolls.
This worsens the already bad situation in which small
societies with close-knit communities are inherently prone to a high degree of
self-censorship. So, journalists omit important facts, de-emphasise the
importance of some developments in their reportage and provide advance warning
of imminent journalistic interventions, even without the promise of a cheque.
This happens on all sides of the political battle-field.
Today, more sophisticated means are being found to mask the
corrosive incidence of journalistic dishonesty. New media platforms are
hijacked by partisan commentary, media phone polls are flooded by well-financed
activists employed mainly to undermine the integrity of already unscientific
opinion research and influential journalists are rewarded to offer manipulated
views of the reality.
All of this poses, in my view, the most critical challenge
to journalistic independence in the Caribbean at this time.
Much of the press freedom advocacy, training and media
literacy work that need to be done can virtually come to nought if the
hijacking of journalism by money and deals wins in the end.
So far, independent journalism, flawed and brittle as it is
in this region is standing its ground. But only just …
