The Association of Taiwan Journalists (ATJ) yesterday panned several newspapers for publishing news report-style stories that were actually campaign ads for candidates in today’s local government elections.
The ATJ found at least 23 articles published in the Chinese-language United Daily News, the China Times and the Apple Daily last month that it considered to be advertisements promoting Yilan County Commissioner Lu Guo-hwa (呂國華), Miaoli County Commissioner Liu Cheng-hung (劉政鴻) and Changhua County Commissioner Cho Po-yuan (卓伯源) — all running for re-election today.
Most of the articles were about each county government’s policies or new projects but the focus was on the commissioners, not on policies or projects, the association said.
Although all the titles were published on “feature” or “featured advertising” pages, the ATJ said it was concerned that readers would confuse the advertisements with news reports since they were written in the style of news reports and most had reporters’ bylines.
“It’s not fair that current county commissioners are taking advantage of their position as serving commissioners to promote themselves in the local government elections,” ATJ chairman Leon Chuang (莊豐嘉) said. “The newspapers that published such articles have lost their reputation as neutral entities that are supposed to publish unbiased stories.”
Chuang said he was especially surprised to see an article published in the China Times on Nov. 10 that not only used a whole page to promote Liu and his policies, but also published poll results favorable to him.
“Readers will just lose confidence in the newspaper,” Chuang said.
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