Asean media eye creation of press council

BANGKOK - Representatives from seven media groups in Southeast Asia yesterday discussed the possibility of establishing an Asean Press Council (APC).

“It will be the most significant development at the heart of the integration of the Asean community,” said Kavi Chongkittavorn, honorary council member of the National Press Council of Thailand (NPCT).

“Once the APC is established, we can apply for stakeholder status in the Asean Secretariat,” he said during the international meeting organized by the NPCT at the Pathumwan Princess Hotel in Bangkok, Thailand.

The 10-member Association of Southeast Nations (Asean) will become a single community by the end of 2015, and the Asean Charter stipulated that the media play a crucial role in promoting Asean awareness and a sense of community, said the concept note on the APC.

“There are only 953 days left before Asean integration takes place,” said Chongkittavorn, “and the media community is still very disconnected. Civil society has already moved ahead. We are the last group (to integrate).”

Regional integration is founded on the three pillars of politics/security, economy and culture.

The APC would bring media cooperation to a higher level in raising awareness on and strengthening the Asean identity.

During yesterday’s meeting, representatives from the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand, which have press councils, showed how varied their experiences were.

Nezar Patria said the Indonesian Press Council gets some of its funding from the state and that it entertained 420 complaints from the public against the media in 2012 alone, ranging from unbalanced coverage and use of unreliable sources to breach of privacy, indecency and defamation.

Cebu Citizens-Press Council (CCPC) deputy director Cherry Ann T. Lim said the group is funded by private donations and media member contributions and accepts complaints only on accuracy and the right of reply.

Ha Minh Hue, vice president of the Vietnam Journalists Association, said there are no private media in Vietnam but that its press law says there is no censorship and the government recently moved to have every ministry appoint a spokesman to give the right information to any citizen who might inquire.

This was done, he said, to correct the false information provided by the Internet.

In Laos, where all newspapers are controlled by the government, although more and more radio and TV stations are now privately owned, there is no restriction on the citizens accessing foreign media like CNN or BBC.

The reason, said Vorasack Pravongviengkham, Lao Journalists Association director, is that Laos shares a border with five countries, so it is difficult to stop people from getting information from other countries.

In Malaysia, the formation of a press council is hampered by disagreements with the government and concerns by journalists about whether the council will be used to curb press freedom, said Chin Sung Chew, president of the National Union of Journalists, Malaysia.

Pen Samitthy, president of the Club of Cambodian Journalists, said while journalists in Cambodia don’t go to jail for libel, news sources can use national security and other laws to file criminal cases that can result in jail terms, so the journalists just practice self-censorship.

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