Fiji’s neighbors yesterday condemned a decision by the military regime that would force Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp to sell or close the Pacific nation’s largest and oldest newspaper.
The regime issued a media decree on Monday that introduces stiff fines and possible prison sentences for journalists, editors and media companies that produce reports deemed to be against the public or national interest.
New rules requiring media companies to be at least 90 percent locally owned will force Murdoch’s Australian arm, News Ltd, to sell or close the Fiji Times within three months.
New Zealand Prime Minister John Key described the decree as “very heavy-handed” and reiterated his call for a speedy return to democracy in Fiji.
“When you start banning media and telling organizations to sell their newspapers, to me it sounds like a step too far,” Key told reporters in Wellington.
Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said imposing the local ownership rules on media would hurt Fiji’s economy, which has struggled since military chief Voreqe Bainimarama toppled the government in a 2006 coup.
“We worry very much that this arbitrary move sends a very bad signal as far as future investment in Fiji is concerned, let alone the very bad signal it sends in terms of freedom of expression, freedom of speech and democratic rights,” Smith told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
But any link between foreign investment and the media decree was denied by Fiji’s Attorney General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, who announced the move on Monday.
“The people who know Fiji … know the issue of the media is very separate to the private sector investment that takes place in other sectors,” Sayed-Khaiyum told Sky News yesterday.
News Ltd chairman and chief executive John Hartigan wrote in the Australian newspaper yesterday that closure of the Fiji Times now seemed inevitable.
“There will not be too many potential publishers wanting to purchase a newspaper with these draconian restrictions hanging over their head — even at a fire-sale price,” Hartigan wrote.
Hartigan also criticized the Australian government for not putting enough pressure on the regime to call elections.
Smith said his government had been at the forefront of Fiji’s suspension from the Pacific Islands Forum and the Commonwealth.
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