Local media in the Solomon Islands have been accused of compromising their independence by entering into agreements with Chinese news organizations and accepting thousands of dollars of equipment from the Chinese embassy.
Since the Solomon Islands government signed a high-profile security agreement with China in March last year, some newspapers in the Pacific country have received vehicles, cameras, phones and printing machinery that costs thousands of dollars from the Chinese government, via its local embassy, local journalists said.
Some have raised concern about the gifts and the continued close dialogue between media organizations in China and the Solomon Islands.
Photo: AP
The Solomon Star newspaper received nearly US$140,000 in funding from the Chinese government and in return pledged to “promote the truth about China’s generosity and its true intentions to help develop” the Pacific Islands country, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) reported.
A funding proposal sent from the Solomon Star to China’s embassy in Honiara, seen by the OCCRP, said that decrepit equipment was causing editions to come out late and “curtailing news flow about China’s generous and lightning economic and infrastructure development in Solomon Islands.”
The OCCRP counted about a dozen instances in the proposal in which funding was said to be needed to tell the Chinese story in a positive light, said the organization’s lead editor for the Pacific, Aubrey Belford.
In an editorial published on Tuesday, the Solomon Star said it had nothing to hide and that it had received funding from China.
The paper denied that the funding had affected its editorial independence, saying it had published “news items not in the favor of China and the Chinese embassy in Honiara never issued a reproachment.”
The Solomon Star said it had also sought funding from Australia and the US, but received no response.
“It’s a complaint we see from Pacific media who have struggled to receive the funding they need to continue as unbiased news organizations,” Belford said. “There’s been a bottomless pit of money for the Pacific if it’s national security or detention of asylum seekers, but when it comes to support civil society and a free press the region has been starved and China has stepped into the void.”
The funding proposal was for money that would go toward printing equipment for the newspaper and a broadcast tower for its affiliated radio station.
A journalist from the Solomon Star, speaking anonymously, said support from the Chinese government and Chinese media partners also arrived in the form of equipment.
The newsroom received a vehicle, cameras, laptops, iPhones and a drone, the journalist said.
“Our editor is part of the team who attended meetings at the [Chinese] embassy here, and these items have been delivered to us. In return we were told to be a bit more sensitive when covering China issues,” the journalist added.
Similar gifts were delivered to the Island Sun newspaper from the Chinese embassy in Honiara, said Ofani Eremae, the paper’s former editor.
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