SUVA, Fiji Islands (PMW): The Fiji Times, the country's largest daily newspaper and the only foreign-owned one, has apologised over a business "fat cats" story in its long-running dispute with Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry over media accuracy and professionalism.

In a report on 18 January 2000, the newspaper cited the front page story published the previous day headlined Share wealth, PM warns businesses", which quoted Chaudhry as saying: "The fat cats must learn to share".

Commenting in an editorial headlined "Why Robin Hood won't do", the Fiji Times attacked the prime minister over the corpulent fat cats statement, saying:

"Mr Chaudhry appears to view the problem in terms of profit versus poverty. It's a 1950s view of the world that has in the past spawned government policies in many countries that aimed to alleviate poverty.

"All of them ultimately failed. Hammering the private sector will not assist the poor."

But on Jan 18, the newspaper admitted that Chaudhry did not use those words: "The fat cats must learn to share".

"The phrase was intended to sum up his overall message and the quotation marks were mistakenly added during the sub-editing process," the paper explained.

"The Fiji Times regrets and apologises for the error."

In its news report, the Rupert Murdoch's News Ltd-owned newspaper said: "The Government has hit out at the Fiji Times report of Prime Minister Chaudhry's speech to the business community last week.

"The Ministry for Information said the Fiji Times front page report quoting the prime minister as describing the businessmen as fat cats who must learn to share was a fabrication.

"'This is the sort of irresponsible journalism that the Government has been complaining about. Mr Chaudhry did not make a generalised statement accusing the business community of wallowing in wealth.'

"The statement said that this was part of what Mr Chaudhry actually said:

"'I want to underscore [World Bank director] Mr [James] Wolfensohn's social message to those in the business sector who decry every move to help the poor, to help more people earn a decent livelihood for themselves.

"'These are people who already have plenty, they are wallowing in wealth and yet they begrudge a slight decline in their projects so others may live decent lives and eat two meals a day."'

In Chaudhry's original speech, he highlighted that more than 70 per cent of the national wealth in the Fiji Islands was concentrated in the hands of just 10 per cent of the population.

In recent months, the Fiji Times and the Government have been engaged in a war of words. Prime Minister Chaudhry and some ministers have accused the newspaper of lack of professionalism and of being biased against the Fiji Labour Party-led coalition Government while the newspaper has in turn accused the government of waging a vendetta against it.

The Fiji Times is currently seeking a judicial review of a Government decision to bar renewal of the work permit of the paper's editor-in-chief Russell Hunter, a Scottish-born career journalist in the Murdoch publishing group.

Lastly, if being a News Ltd employee for six years of my 31 in this industry makes me "a career journalist in the Murdoch publishing group" that's fine by me. Others might differ.

We are quite satisfied that this is a balanced and accurate report, and has indeed been parallelled by other news sources quite independently (see Prime Minister gets apology and other links above).

Our report made it clear that the apology was over the phrase referring to "fat cats" and we quoted extensively from the Fiji Times newspaper's own two reports (page 3, Jan 18) as indicated in the sourcing and attribution. The Fiji Times' error was fundamental to the original front page story on Jan 17. We identified the Ministry of Information statement as such and stated that it was being quoted by the Fiji Times. What we published of the statement was in the context of the ongoing media controversy in Fiji.

Also, the Fiji Times' own website, maintained by Fiji Village, did not publish the denial by the Fiji government, or the paper's apology, in its Jan 18 online edition (as had been published in the print edition), even though the original "fat cats" report was published on line the previous day. An unfortunate omission.

+++niuswire

PACIFIC MEDIA WATCH is an independent, non-profit, non-government organisation comprising journalists, lawyers, editors and other media workers, dedicated to examining issues of ethics, accountability, censorship, media freedom and media ownership in the Pacific region. Launched in October 1996, it has links with Journalism Program at the University of the South Pacific, Bushfire-Media, Journalism Studies at the University of PNG (UPNG), the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism (ACIJ), and Pactok Communications, in Sydney and Port Moresby.

© 1996-98 Copyright - All rights reserved. Items are provided solely for review purposes as a non-profit educational service. Copyright remains the property of the original producers as indicated. Recipients should seek permission from the copyright owner for any publishing. Copyright owners not wishing their materials to be posted by PMW please contact us. The views expressed in material listed by PMW are not necessarily the views of PMW or its members. Recipients should rely on their own inquiries before making decisions based on material listed in PMW. Please copy appeals to PMW and acknowledge source.

For further information, inquiries about joining the Pacific Media Watch listserve, articles for publication, and giving feedback contact Pacific Media Watch at:

E-mail: niusedita@pactok.net.au or bfmedia@peg.apc.org
Fax: (+679) 30 5779 or (+612) 9660 1804
Mail: PO Box 9, Annandale, NSW 2038, Australia
or, c/o Journalism, PO Box 1168, Suva, Fiji
Website: http://www.pactok.net/docs/pmw

Return to Pacific Media Watch