‘BE COURAGEOUS IN YOUR QUEST FOR TRUTH,’ PMC DIRECTOR TELLS PACIFIC JOURNALISM GRADUATES

Pacific journalism academic Professor David Robie believes the media play a critical role in exposing abuses of power in a world increasingly hostile towards journalists.

However, journalists in the Pacific are frequently “persecuted by smallminded politicians with scant regard for the role of the media,” he says.

Speaking at the 18th University of the South Pacific Journalism Student Awards ceremony at Laucala campus in Suva, Fiji, last October, Dr Robie said despite the growing global dangers surrounding the profession, journalism was critically important for democracy.

Dr Robie said that while such “ghastly fates” for journalists – such as the extrajudicial killing of Saudi dissident writer Jamal Khashoggi in Turkey earlier that month – may seem remote in the Pacific, there were plenty of attacks on media freedom to contend with, while trolls in the region and state threats to internet freedom were “also rife”.

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GLOBAL PRESS FREEDOM SUMMIT INCLUDES PMC
The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders recently hosted press freedom defenders from the Asia-Pacific for a summit in the French capital.
Invited participants included Pacific Media Centre director Professor David Robie and delegates from Australia and Papua New Guinea among the 23 correspondents from 17 countries or territories.

The representatives were from Afghanistan, Australia, Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Hongkong, Maldives, Mongolia, Nepal, New Zealand, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Taiwan, Thailand and Tibet along with a team of Paris-based RSF advocates.

Asia Pacific head Daniel Bastard said the consultation was part of a new strategy making better use of the correspondents’ network to make the impact of advocacy work faster and even more effectively than in the past.

Dr Robie is convenor of the Pacific Media Watch freedom project which has employed post graduate students in part-time reporting/editing/research roles.

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