The Guyana Human Rights Association (GHRA) and the France-based Reporters Without Borders (Reporters San Frontieres) have condemned the Guyana government's withdrawal of state advertisements from the Stabroek News.

Permanent Secretary in the Office of the President, Dr Nanda Gopaul had instructed the Government Information Agency (GINA) to withdraw all government/ministries advertisements except for VAT ads. GINA has since said that the withdrawal was due to commercial reasons but Stabroek News Editor-in- Chief, David de Caires has rejected this as a "contrivance".

In a release issued yesterday, the GHRA said that "the decision to deny government advertisements to Stabroek News has the hallmarks of an act of political vindictiveness" and is to be condemned, more so if it was on the instruction of Permanent Secretary of the Office of the President, Dr Nanda Gopaul.

The GINA release issued on Monday did not deny that Dr Gopaul had ordered the cessation of advertising and neither has Dr Gopaul said anything publicly on the matter.

The GHRA said that even if the advertising arguments put forward by GINA were valid "they do not legitimize the action taken. Any government which values pluralism, impartiality and inclusiveness would utilise its influence to ensure State revenues were available to a range of stake-holders. This is true of procurement and tendering processes as well as advertising revenue."

In the present case, the GHRA said that "Dr. Gopaul's alleged intervention makes nonsense of GINA's claim that the decision was based on circulation data and advertising considerations."

Stating that the key issue at stake was not lost revenue to Stabroek News, but the effect such loss may have on its ability to impart ideas and opinions to those who rely on it for information, the GHRA said "squalid practices such as these are ominous reminders to an older generation of the worst features of the Burnham era". Restricting Stabroek News' capacity to function also violates the rights of all those who rely on its information and opinions, the GHRA argued.

The GHRA said that incidents such as this also raise questions about GINA, and the role of its Director and the agency "being used as an instrument to sustain confrontational politics by persistent intemperate attacks on the political opposition and other perceived 'enemies of the State'."

Calling on both GINA and the Office of the President to develop more equitable and transparent policies, thereby raising levels of public confidence in their integrity, the GHRA said that despite the progressively deteriorating standards exhibited by GINA, the GHRA was shocked by the step taken against Stabroek News, which suggests that an even more confrontational posture was being adopted.

Close eye

Meanwhile, condemning "what appears to be the Guyana Government's retaliatory action against positions being taken by the Stabroek News", a statement yesterday from the Nation Publishing House - the publishers of the Barbados Daily Nation - is calling on President Bharrat Jagdeo to personally intervene and stop this assault on press freedom.

Reports that the Guyana government had withdrawn its advertising from the Stabroek News "are most disturbing," the statement, which was sent from the desk of the Executive Director, Roxanne Gibbs said.

The statement said that "If these reports are indeed correct, then we have returned to the bad old days of the 1980's when censorship and governmental pressure were exercised through the control of newsprint."

That the newspaper's supposed "small circulation" was the reason for the withdrawal is questionable, the statement said adding that it was common knowledge that the Government of the day has been critical of the paper's editorial stance.

"The use of the withdrawal of advertising as a weapon against the news media is particularly distressing since the press and the people in the Caribbean have enjoyed press freedom and are rightly angered when that freedom is threatened in anyway," the statement said.

The statement said that The Nation newspaper in Barbados "is keeping a close eye on the situation and will not hesitate to join with our colleagues in bringing this threat to the attention of the world press associations such as the International Press Organisation, the Commonwealth Press Union and the Inter- American Press Association."

Editor-at-Large of the Trinidad Express, Keith Smith yesterday told this newspaper by telephone that if the government indeed withdrew advertisements from the Stabroek News its actions "were reprehensible given the freedom of the press that Guyana enjoyed in recent years."

He reiterated that the tactic of withdrawal of advertising revenue that some governments try to use to punish the media for accommodating articles and opinions that were critical of the government is unacceptable. "We would have hoped that this new government of democracy is not using high-handed tactics to suppress the freedom of the press and particularly the likes of the Stabroek News, which has served Guyana well and stood up to the cause."

Smith said it was "heart rending to see this same government using Burnhamite tactics" against the free press.

Meanwhile, the United States Embassy in Georgetown has said that while it has no role in the dispute between the Stabroek News and the government, the US was always concerned about issues of freedom of the press since it was an essential tenet of democracy as outlined in Article 4 of the Organisation of American States' Inter-American Charter. President Bharrat Jagdeo is a signatory to the charter.

Article 4 of the charter states that, "Transparency in government activities, probity, responsible public administration on the part of governments, respect for social rights, and freedom of expression and of the press are essential components of the exercise of democracy."

Yesterday, too, Reporters Without Borders (RSF), the Paris-based international non-governmental organization, which advocates for freedom of the press said in a release that "Governments must not allocate advertising to some news media as a reward, and withdraw it from others as a punishment."

The organisation said that, "Unfortunately, the government's silence in the face of the Stabroek News' legitimate demands suggests that the newspaper is being financially penalised because of its editorial positions" adding that, "The government must provide an explanation and if it is slow to do so, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights should instruct it to provide one."

Impact maximization

In response to Stabroek News going public with its complaint to the government, GINA said that the issue Stabroek News raised was "not about press freedom" and the government placement of its advertisements "pertains to economics and impact maximization of its advertisements."

Rejecting GINA's explanation, which he described as "contrived and fictitious" de Caires emphasised that government's action was "a direct political intervention which follows the recent numerous attacks on Stabroek News by President Jagdeo. It has nothing to do with a commercial evaluation based on circulation and everything to do with political victimisation" and that the decision has tarnished the democratic credentials of the government.

De Caires explained that since the beginning of November 2006, the Advertising Manager Patricia Cumbermack reported a significant reduction in the booking of government ministries' advertisements from GINA. She later advised that except for advertisements from the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) dealing with the impending Value Added Tax (VAT) no other bookings were being received from GINA.

After several efforts were made to contact the Director of GINA, Dr Prem Misir to discuss the matter, failed, de Caires wrote Dr Misir on January 2 referring to the cessation of advertisements which he said had resulted directly from a political directive from Dr Gopaul and stated that this was a direct attack on the newspaper for political reasons and was completely unacceptable.

He noted that President Jagdeo had signed the declaration of Chapultepec, a famous declaration of free press principles adopted by the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) in Mexico City on March 11, 1994 and requested Dr Misir to "urgently review this new discriminatory policy and that you let me have your written assurance that you will not persist with it."

On January 9, 2007, Advertising Coordinator of the GINA Advertising Unit, Karen Persaud in a reply, which referred to the letter stated that "the issues raised have been acknowledged and have now been presented to the relevant department for review".

On January 10, 2007, de Caires responded as follows: "Your statement that 'the issues raised have been acknowledged and have now been presented to the relevant department for review' is unclear and unsatisfactory. We must assume it to mean that Dr Gopaul's directive to cut off all ministry ads from our newspaper has been withdrawn and that we will now receive an appropriate proportion of these advertisements. We will monitor the situation for the next week and in the meantime, have withheld the press release which we had planned to issue today."

GINA responded to the Stabroek News release saying that de Caires and the Stabroek News have no monopoly on acquiring advertisements; the newspaper no longer had the largest circulation; it was not the largest private newspaper in Guyana; that the basis for the placement of advertisement in the media was linked to the public's response to such advertisements; and that huge responses to government's advertisements come from the Kaieteur News and the Guyana Chronicle.

In response to GINA, de Caires said that GINA gave no explanation to him but added that the circulation of Kaieteur News was never audited or published unlike that of Stabroek News; the circulation of the Chronicle is not published and is widely believed to be extremely low. The Stabroek News online edition, he said, attracts well over 10,000 visitors a day.

De Caires also said that the Stabroek News has extensive coverage of business news and other areas which the other newspapers hardly ever touch. He argued that for this reason the advertisements placed by the ministries, which often deal with issues like tendering for contracts, are much more likely to evoke a response if published in the Stabroek News.

The Guyana Press Association has also condemned government's actions noting that the reporting and editorial stance the paper and the criticisms of the papers by the Head of State, President Bharrat Jagdeo in recent months, was "a clear example of the government using state funds as a weapon against its critics."

Describing the action as a "dastardly" one given the fact that the government was a signatory to the declaration of Chapultepec, the GPA President Denis Chabrol said that the GPA would be taking a firm stand on the issue. He recalled that this was not the first time that the government had withdrawn advertisements from the Stabroek News and urged the government to revisit its position and that the issue be resolved amicably.

The GPA said having regard to the pre-1992 situation when the then administration had severely curtailed access not only to the State Media by its critics but suffocated the importation of newsprint by newspapers that it had considered virtual enemies of the State, it was mindful of similar acts of discrimination when they emerge.

Stabroek News Editor Anand Persaud also noted that GINA had never before announced a policy of apportioning ads on the basis of circulation or on the supposed response to advertisements. He said GINA should provide to the public evidence of its supposed canvassing of "responses" to the advertisements and explain how this was done.

Persaud added that GINA's silence for weeks on this issue was also damning. He noted that despite dozens of queries from Stabroek News on the cut off of ads the state information agency remained silent and only responded when the newspaper went public. He said the agency's attitude to the queries was more "befitting of a Stalinist state" than of a reborn democracy. He noted that when GINA was headed by the current Minister of Agriculture, Robert Persaud, queries were answered promptly.