ROLE OF MEDIA IN PROMOTING GOOD GOVRNANCE
-RUDIGER LEMP, GERMAN AMBASSADOR TO NEPAL.
Although I have to admit to being neither a media specialist nor possessing
much experience of my own in good governance, I would like to thank the organizers of the
seminar for inviting my contribution. Let me warn you from the outset: it will entirely
consist of a layman's personal ideas.
The title of our seminar seems to imply the suggestion that the role of the
media in promoting good governance is a positive one, all the more positive if the
constitutional freedom of the press is guaranteed and implemented in reality. For the
kingdom of Nepal, where freedom of the press by and large has developed into a remarkable
success story since the new constitution of November 1990 entered into force, this would
have meant that good governance should also flourish here. Now, according to a vast
majority of observers and even representatives of the political and business
establishment, this is clearly not the case. Some people even argue and I do not know
where their figures come from-that the country loses a greater amount of valuable and
scarce development resources through bad governance than all the combined foreign donor
contributions can make up for.
Why then was the media not able to play the positive role expected from it?
This would seem to deserve some analysis. In theory, free media coverage and dissemination
not only assure the information and transparency required for rational decision-making, it
also exposes bad governance such as abuse of authority, mismanagement, inefficiency and
corruption. There appear to be several preconditions that must be fulfilled before the
media can have the expected positive effect on good governance. Among those one could
list:
-The ability to access, verify, collect, process and correctly present
information;
-The ability to reach people;
-A mechanism for interaction between an informed public and decision makers;
As far as situation in Nepal is concerned, it is not difficult to detect
substantial deficits in all three requirements just listed.
Let us start with the first set of preconditions: Although freedom of the
press has largely become a reality at least up to November 26, the enormous number of
different publications and their often precarious financial base as well as the
inaccessibility of much of the country's terrain makes the collection of authentic
information rather difficult for most, if not all publications in Nepal. This limiting
factor has not been made easier to overcome by the current state of emergency, of course,
but will probably prevail even after the return to normality becomes possible in the near
future, as we all hope. Material constraints can be made worse if the journalists do not
possess the dedication and sense of responsibility required doing their job properly.
Journalists experience enormous competitive pressure. Their product has to sell.
Unfortunately, publishing rumors and half-truths can often enhance sales. Until properly
researched and verified, a story sometimes appears no longer newsworthy. Once readers,
viewers or listeners find out about unreliable coverage media, credibility is weakened. As
a result the role of the media as promoter of good governance suffers serious setbacks.
As for the ability of the media to reach the people, there are first of all
obvious limitations when about half of them are unable to read and write. Where can they
get their information from? Only radio transmissions reach a large part of the illiterate
population, although not every one can afford a radio set. Radio Nepal, which holds a
dominant position still even after the more recent emergence of numerous privately owned
FM stations, is state owned and government controlled. Its role in provoking a critical
feedback from the people to decision-makers and thus fostering good governance, therefore,
has to be rather marginal.
Thirdly, the mechanism of interaction between the people, "in high
places" and the common man, for whose benefit all the decision makers really should
act, cannot only consist in democratic elections every four or five years. If the common
people do not see a possibility or do not really try "to be counted" and
listened to in between elections, good governance" probably becomes elusive. This is
perhaps Nepal's biggest problem. Critical researching and reporting by the media can only
improve good governance if people are willing not only to complain, but to act as well. If
you take the case of corruption in Nepal, a veritable flood of-sometimes also not
substantiated, but rumor-based-reports has spurred little action from the grass roots
level within the democratic framework of an open society (although-helas! -the Maoist
insurgency has greatly benefited from a wide-spread sense of frustration over endemic
corruption in the country!). regrettably, one can also sense a certain
"overkill" as a result of such reporting: Instead of triggering corrective
action by responsive decision makers, it has mostly contributed to a general and pervasive
apathy: What is the point of chopping off a few of the Hydra's heads if they instantly
grow back tenfold? The lack of a well-balanced corrective mechanism can also have the
opposite effect intended by the critical role of the media, i.e., when no-one is willing
to take any decision at all any more for fear of being publicly chastised. This obviously
does not lead to good governance either. A case in point was perhaps the inability Royal
Nepal Airlines to secure the carrying capacity required to survive after the public outcry
over the Lauda and South West scandals.
I hope I have not been too provocative in questioning the assumption that
there is always an entirely positive correlation between independent and critical media on
the one hand and good governance on the other. We are discussing a fascinating and
multi-facetted subject. This seminar wills certainly not run out of steam in one afternoon
Thank you for listening.
Speech made by the author as the chief guest at a media seminar organized by
the Telegraph Weekly in close cooperation with the FES on December 20, 2001-Chief editor. |
