Another meeting to comment on the draft of the election coverage guidelines for the state TV and radio station. This time the whirlwind Information Minister paused long enough for me to snap a picture.
Meeting started off with a bang. The previous night, TVM news decided not to air the "official" live coverage of the president being "congratulated by the public" on the awards he received in India and Sri Lanka earlier this month. However, the programming department then pre-empted the 9 pm English newscast to air an hour of people singing the praises of President Gayoom and declaring him their "president for life." Obviously this was a campaign event, probably staged by his party supporters, thinly disguised as an offical "head of state" event. Radio also carried it live, over the objections of the radio news director. This is just a sample of the problems we are going to face in the coming election if the state media outlets appear to be puppets of the incumbent government. The new guidelines are aimed at making sure this doesn't happen again.
That evening, the president's press office issued a statement saying the president wanted to thank the people for putting on the big show for him. Three weeks ago, the newscasts would have read this two page-release verbatim on the air. Not anymore. Journalists are now empowered to make a decision about whether the president's gratitude for this feel-good event 24 hours ago was newsworthy. You can guess what was decided. Not newsworthy. The president is making his State of the Union speech to parliament tomorrow and we did a package on that, with reaction bites from majority and opposition MPs because that IS news.
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