Today, I gave the opening speech at an introductory seminar on ‘open data’ held at the Sri Lanka Press Institute, Colombo, on 15 Oct 2015.
Organised by InterNews and Transparency International Sri Lanka, the seminar explored the concepts of ‘open data’ and ‘big data’ and discussed that role civil society, media and technologists can play in advocating to government to open up its data, enabling a culture of transparency and open government.
An Open Dialogue on Open Data – 15 Oct 2015 Coloombo – L to R – Sriganesh Lokanathan, Nalaka Gunawardene, Sanjana Hattotuwa [Photo by Sam de Silva]My premise was that while the proliferation of digital tools and growth of web-based data storage (the cloud) opens up new possibilities for information generation and sharing, South Asian societies need to tackle institutional and cultural factors before democratised and digital data can really transform governance and development. Our countries must adopt more inclusive policies and practices for public sharing of scientific and other public data.
This resonates with a call by the United Nations for a ‘data revolution for development’. I cited the UN Secretary-General’s Independent Expert Advisory Group on a Data Revolution for Sustainable Development (IEAG) highlighted this in a report titled A World That Counts: Mobilising The Data Revolution for Sustainable Development (Nov 2014).
A World that Counts…
I also referred to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that were adopted by member states of the UN at a heads of state level summit in New York on 25-27 September 2015. Underpinning all 17 SDGs is an explicit recognition of the value of data for development — to better inform decisions, and to better monitor progress.
Sri Lanka’s President Maithripala Sirisena addressed the Summit, and officially committed Sri Lanka to the SDGs. I argue that implicit in that commitment is a recognition of data for development and open data policies. We now need to ask our government to introduce a government-wide policy on data collection, storage and sharing. In short, it must open up!
This was my open call to the President to open up:
Open Your Govt’s Data, Mr President! Hope you don’t give us HAL’s famous answer…
Sri Lanka has taken tentative steps towards open data. In 2013, the Open Data initiative of Government started making some official datasets freely available online. It focuses on machine-readable (well-structured and open) datasets.
I quoted from my own recent op-ed published in Daily Mirror broadsheet newspaper:
After many years of advocacy by civil society, Sri Lanka will soon adopt a law that guarantees citizens’ Right to Information (RTI). It has recently been added to the Constitution as a fundamental right.
Passing the RTI law is only a beginning — institutionalising it requires much effort, considerable funds, and continued vigilance on civil society’s part.
RTI is Coming: Are We Ready? My question to Lankan civil society and media
As champions of RTI, media and civil society must now switch roles, I said. While benefiting from RTI themselves, they can nurture the newly promised openness in every sphere, showing citizens how best to make use of it. Reorienting our public institutions to a new culture of openness and information sharing will be an essential step.
The term ‘smart city’ refers to urban systems, and not to the smartness of residents. In fact, there is no universal definition of smart cities: it can mean smart utilities, smart housing, smart mobility or smart design.
Smart cities use information and communications technologies (ICTs) as their principal infrastructure. These become the basis for improving the quality and performance of urban services, reducing costs and resource consumption, and for engaging citizens more effectively.
ICTs – ranging from automatic sensors to data centres — would create ‘feedback loops’ within the complex city systems. If processed properly, this flow of data in real time can vastly improve the design of “hard” physical environment and the provision of “soft” services to citizens.
In this week’s Ravaya column, (in Sinhala, appearing in issue of 4 Oct 2015), I explore the concept of smart cities, which the new government of Sri Lanka wants to develop.
It is a formidable task. India in 2014 announced an ambitious programme to create 100 smart cities. Under this, state capitals, as well as many tourist and heritage cities are to receive funding for upgrading their infrastructure. But Prime Minister Modi and his technocrats have been struggling since then to explain just what they mean by smart cities.
I argue that smart cities need empowered people and engaged city administrators. I have argued in earlier in this column, concrete and steel do not a city make. Likewise, ICT enabled smart infrastructure alone will not create smart cities – unless the human factor is well integrated.
Over the weekend of September 25 – 27, the United Nations headquarters in New York hosted the Sustainable Development Summit 2015. It was a high-level segment of the 70th UN General Assembly that was attended by many world leaders including Sri Lanka’s President Maithripala Sirisena.
Sustainable Development Summit 2015 Logo
The UN, which turns 70 this year, is once again rallying its member governments to a lofty vision and ambitious goal: to embark on new paths to improve the lives of people everywhere.
For this, the Summit adopted a new and improved global task-list called Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Prepared after two years of worldwide consultations, the SDGs offer a blueprint for development until 2030.
There are 17 SDGs tackling long-standing problems like ending poverty and reducing inequality to relatively newer challenges like creating more liveable cities and tackling climate change. These are broken down into 169 specific targets. Their implementation will formally begin on 1 January 2016.
SDGs in a nutshell – courtesy UN
The SDGs are to take over from the Millennium Development Goals, or MDGs, that have guided the development sector for 15 years. Sri Lanka was among the 189 countries that adopted the MDGs at the Millennium Summit the UN hosted in New York in September 2000. On that occasion, the country was represented by Lakshman Kadirgamar as Minister of Foreign Affairs.
The eight MDGs covered a broad spectrum of goals, from eradicating absolute poverty and hunger to combating HIV, and from ensuring all children attend primary school to saving mothers from dying during pregnancy and childbirth.
Much has happened in the nearly 5,500 days separating the adoption of the original MDGs and now, the successor SDGs. This month, as the world commits to ‘leaving no one behind’ (as UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has said), it is useful to look back, briefly.
Good ‘Report Card’
How has Sri Lanka pursued the MDGs while the country coped with a long drawn civil war, political change, and the fall-out of a global economic recession?
In fact, it has done reasonably well. In its human development efforts, Sri Lanka has quietly achieved a great deal. However, there are gaps that need attention, and some goals not yet met.
We might sum it up with a phrase that teachers are fond of using, even on good students: “You’re doing well – but can do better! Try harder!”
For the past 15 years, the MDGs have provided a framework for Sri Lanka’s national development programmes. Progress has been assessed every few years: the most recent ‘report card’ came out in March 2015.
The MDG Country Report 2014, prepared by the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS), is a joint publication by the Government of Sri Lanka and the United Nations in Sri Lanka. Data from the 2012 census and Household Income and Expenditure Survey 2012/13 have generated plenty of data to assess MDG situation across the country, including the war affected areas.
“Sri Lanka has already achieved the targets of 13 important MDG indicators out of 44 indicators relevant to Sri Lanka. Most of the other indicators are either ‘On Track’ or progressing well,” says IPS Executive Director Dr Saman Kelegama in his foreword to the report.
Highlights
The report offers insights into how Sri Lanka’s ‘soft infrastructure’ — all the systems and institutions required to maintain the economic, health, cultural and social standards of a country – are faring.
Consider these highlights:
Sri Lanka’s overall income poverty rates, when measured using accepted statistical benchmarks, have come down from 2% in 2006/7 to 6.7% in 2012.
Unemployment rate has declined from 8% in 1993 to 3.9% in 2012. However, unemployment rate among women is twice as high as among men.
While food production keeps up with population growth, malnutrition is a concern. A fifth of all children under five are underweight. And half of all people still consume less than the minimum requirement of daily dietary energy.
Nearly all (99%) school going children enter primary school. At that stage, the numbers of boys and girls are equal. In secondary school and beyond (university), in fact, there now are more girls than boys.
More babies now survive their first year of life than ever before: infant mortality rate has come down to 9.4 among 1,000 live births (from 17.7 in 1991). Deaths among children under five have also been nearly halved (down from 2 in 1991 to 11.3 in 2009).
Fewer women die needlessly of complications arising from pregnancy and childbirth. The maternal mortality rate, which stood at 92 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1990, plummeted to 33 by 2010. Doctors or skilled health workers are now present during almost all births.
Sri Lanka’s HIV infection levels have remained now, even though the number of cases is slowly increasing. Meanwhile, in a major public health triumph, the country has all but eradicated malaria: there have been no indigenous malaria cases since November 2012, and no malaria-related deaths since 2007.
More Lankans now have access to safe drinking water (up from 68% in 1990 to almost 90% in 2012-2013.)
These and other social development outcomes are the result of progressive policies that have been sustained for decades.
“Sri Lanka’s long history of investment in health, education and poverty alleviation programmes has translated into robust performance against the MDGs, and Sri Lanka has many lessons to share,” said Sri Lanka’s UN Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative, Subinay Nandy, at the report’s launch in March 2015.
Proportion of Lankans living below the poverty line – total head count and breakdown by district
Mind the Gaps!
Despite these results, many gaps and challenges remain that need closer attention and action in the coming years.
One key concern is how some impressive national level statistics can eclipse disparities at provincial and district levels. The MDG data analysis clearly shows that all parts of Sri Lanka have not progressed equally well.
For example, while most districts have already cut income poverty rates in half, there are some exceptions. These include eight districts in the Northern and Eastern provinces, for which reliable data are not available to compare with earlier years, and the Monaragala District in Uva Province – where poverty has, in fact, increased in the past few years.
Likewise, many human development indicators are lower in the plantation estate sector, where 4.4% of the population lives. An example: while at least 90% of people in urban and rural areas can access safe drinking water, the rate in the estate sector is 46.3%.
Another major concern: the gap between rich and poor remains despite economic growth. “Income inequality has not changed, although many poor people managed to move out of poverty and improve their living conditions,” the MDG Progress report says.
In Gender Equality, Sri Lanka’s performance is mixed. There is no male-female disparity in education, and in fact, there are more literate women in the 15 to 24 age than men. But “these achievements have not helped in increasing the share of women in wage employment in the non-agricultural sector,” notes the report.
Disappointingly, women’s political participation is also very low. The last Parliament had 13 women members out of 225. That was 5.8% compared to the South Asian rate of 17.8% and global rate of 21.1%. The report has urged for “measures to encourage a substantial increase in the number of women in political offices”.
Of course, MDGs and human development are not just a numbers game. While measurable progress is important, quality matters too.
The MDG report highlights the urgent need to improve the quality and relevance of our public education. Among the policy measures needed are increasing opportunities for tertiary education, bridging the gap between education and employment, and reducing the skills mismatch in the labour market.
On the health front, too, there is unfinished – and never ending — business. Surveillance for infectious diseases cannot be relaxed. Even as malaria fades away, dengue has been spreading. Old diseases like tuberculosis (8,000 cases per year) stubbornly persist. A rise in non-communicable diseases – like heart attacks, stroke, cancers and asthma – poses a whole new set of public health challenges.
Sri Lanka offers the safest motherhood in South Asia
Open Development
So the ‘well-performing’ nation of Sri Lanka still has plenty to do. It is just as important to sustain progress already achieved.
The new and broader SDGs will provide guidance in this process, but each country must set its own priorities and have its own monitoring systems. The spread of information and communications technologies (ICTs) has created new sources of real-time data that can help keep track of progress, or lack of it, more easily and faster.
Whereas MDGs covered mostly “safe” themes like poverty, primary education and child deaths, the SDGs take on topics such as governance, institutions, human rights, inequality, ageing and peace. This reflects how much international debates have changed since the late 1990s when the MDGs were developed mostly by diplomats and technocrats.
This time around, not only governments and academics but advocacy groups and activists have also been involved in hundreds of physical and virtual consultations to agree on SDGs. In total, more than seven million people have contributed their views.
As the government of Sri Lanka pursues the SDGs that it has just committed to in New York, we the people expect a similar consultative process.
Goodbye, closed development. Welcome, Open Development!
Science writer Nalaka Gunawardene wrote an earlier version of this for UN Population Fund (UNFPA) Sri Lanka’s new blog Kiyanna.lk. The views are his own, based on 25 years of development communication experience.
Equal numbers of girls and boys go to school in Sri Lanka today, But women struggle harder to find employment.
In their manifesto for the Parliamentary Election in August 2015, the United National Front for Good Governance talked about Megapolis. Now in office, UNFGG wants to make it happen.
The proposal is not exactly new. It first emerged over a decade ago, when Ranil Wickremesinghe was last Prime Minister. The original plan was developed by CESMA International, a part of Singapore’s state-run Housing Development Corporation (now rebranded as Surbana).
The aim was to create a large metropolitan region “expanding outwards from Colombo to Avissawella in the north and Panadura to the south”.
The revived megapolis plan would probably resemble original. And it looks set to become the Mahaweli of the new government.
Despite regime change in January 2015, we in Sri Lanka still live with corruption, technocratic arrogance and political expediency. Our rulers love to monitor private actions of citizens in the name of ‘national security’. Can megapolis or smart cities become another extension of our overbearing state?
I argue here that the new government must also learn from the decade-long misadventure of Hambantota where investments did not match local needs or people’s aspirations.
See also: My interview with Dr Ranil Senanayake (2012):
The architecture of the mainstream media, and increasingly, social media (even though distinct divisions between the two are increasingly blurred) to varying degrees reflects or contests the timbre of governance and the nature of government.
How can ‘acts of journalism’ by citizens revitalise democracy and how can journalism itself be revived to engage more fully with its central role as watchdog?
In a global contest around editorial independence stymied by economic interests within media institutions, how can Sri Lanka’s media best ensure it attracts, trains and importantly, retains a calibre of journalists who are able to take on the excesses of power, including the silencing of inconvenient truths by large corporations?
The panel, moderated by lawyer and political scientist Asoka Obeyesekere comprised freelance journalist Amantha Perera, Sunday Observer editor Lakshman Gunasekera, and myself.
Here are my opening remarks (including some remarks made during Q&A).
Nalaka Gunawardene speaks during media panel at Corridors of Power – Photo by Manisha Aryal
Panel on “Framing discourse: Media, Power and Democracy”
20 Sep 2015, Colombo
Remarks by Nalaka Gunawardene
Curator Sanjana has asked us to reflect on a key question: What is the role of media in securing democracy against its enemies, within the media itself and beyond?
I would argue that we are in the midst of multiple, overlapping deficits:
Democracy Deficit, a legacy of the past decade in particular, which is now recognised and being addressed (but we have a long way to go)
Public Trust Deficit in politicians and public institutions – not as widely recognised, but is just as pervasive and should be worrying us all.
Media Deficit, probably the least recognised deficit of all. This has nothing to do with media’s penetration or outreach. Rather, it concerns how our established (or mainstream) MEDIA FALLS SHORT IN PERFORMING the responsibilities of watchdog, public platform and the responsibility to “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable”.
In this context, can new media – citizens leveraging the web, mobile devices and the social media platforms – bridge this deficit?
My answer is both: YES and NO!
YES because new media opportunities can be seized – and are being seized — by our citizens to enhance a whole range of public interest purposes, including:
Political participation
Advocacy and activism
Transparency and accountability in public institutions
Peace-building and reconciliation
Monitoring and critiquing corporate conduct
All these trends are set to grow and involve more and more citizens in the coming years. Right now, one in four Lankans uses the web, mostly thru mobile devices.
BUT CAN IT REPLACE THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA?
NO, not in the near term. For now, these counter-media efforts are not sufficient by themselves to bridge the three deficits I have listed above. The mainstream media’s products have far more outreach and and the institutions, far more resources.
Also, the rise of citizen-driven new media does NOT – and should NOT — allow mainstream media to abdicate its social responsibilities.
This is why we urgently need MEDIA SECTOR REFORMS in Sri Lanka – to enhance editorial independence AND professionalism.
The debate is no longer about who is better – Mainstream media (MSM) or citizen driven civic media.
WE NEED BOTH.
So let us accept and celebrate our increasingly HYBRID MEDIA REALITY (‘hybrid’ seems to be currently popular!). This involves, among other things:
MSM drawing on Civic Media content; and
Civic Media spreading MSM content even as they critique MSM
To me, what really matters are the ACTS OF JOURNALISM – whether they are RANDOM acts or DELIBERATE acts of journalism.
Let me end by drawing on my own experience. Trained and experienced in mainstream print and broadcast media, I took to web-based social media 8 years ago when I started blogging (for fun). I started tweeting five years ago, and am about to cross 5,000 followers.
It’s been an interesting journey – and nowhere near finished yet.
Rational demarcation of Ministry subject areas (a lost cause now)
Implications of XXL Cabinet of the National/Consensus Govt
Questionable role of our Attorney General in certain prosecutions
Report on Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) Session
Is Death Penalty the right response to rise of brutal murders?
Can our media be more restrained and balanced in covering sexual crimes involving minors?
How to cope with Hate Speech on ethnic or religious grounds
What kind of Smart Cities or MegaCity do we really need?
How to hold CocaCola LK responsible for polluting Kelani waters?
Yes, many of these are fleeting and incomplete conversations. So what?
And also, there’s a lot of noise in social media: it’s what I call the Global Cacophony.
BUT these conversations and cross-talk often enrich my own understanding — and hopefully help other participants too.
Self-promotional as this might sound, how many Newspaper Editors in Sri Lanka can claim to have as many public conversations as I am having using social media?
Let me end with the closing para in a chapter on social media and governance I recently wrote for Transparency International’s Sri Lanka Governance Report 2014 (currently in print):
“Although there have been serious levels of malgovernance in Sri Lanka in recent years, the build up on social media platforms to the Presidential Election 2015 showed that Lankan citizens have sufficient maturity to use ICTs and other forms of social mobilisation for a more peaceful call for regime change. Channelling this civic energy into governance reform is the next challenge.”
Citizen Meme protesting Coca Cola Sri Lanka polluting Kelani River, source of metro Colombo’s drinking water supplies
In this week’s Ravaya column, (in Sinhala, appearing in issue of 13 Sep 2015), I look at the controversy surrounding Coca Cola Sri Lanka polluting a key river in Sri Lanka on two occasions in August 2015.
The water contamination was caused when an oil tank at Coca Cola Beverages Sri Lanka Ltd in Biyagama leaked, causing effluents to enter the nearby Kelani River on 17 and 28 August 2015.
Kelani is the second longest river in Sri Lanka, and source of water that is treated and distributed to Greater Colombo and Gampaha metropolitan areas by the state owned utility, the National Water Supply and Drainage Board (NWSDB).
This oil leak aggravated chemical pollution of Kelani River, already the highest polluted water body in the country. The Water Board and state environmental regulator CEA have investigated this oil leak, but details of their findings have not been made public except for media statements.
The incident has highlighted the lack of accountability on the part of both corporate entities and state regulators. It also raised concerns about the country’s environmental monitoring capabilities (samples always have to be sent to India or Singapore for testing, delaying investigations).
High profile Coca Cola is not the only industrial polluter of water sources in Sri Lanka. For example, a diesel powered thermal power plant in Chunnakam, in Jaffna district, has been accused of polluting the groundwater in that area. Over 18,000 residents have been affected, some of who have been protesting for months. The company involved, MTD Walkers PLC, denies responsibility (whereas Coca Cola Sri Lanka belatedly accepted the blame and reportedly paid a heavy fine).
Coca Cola pollutes Kelani River in Sri Lanka: Cartoon by Dharshana Karunathilake
A Popular Election Meme created by Hashtag Generation, Sri Lanka
“Every citizen – including activists and academics — can play a part in shaping the future of our democracy. In this, technology is not the only key driver; what matters even more is the strategic use of our imagination and determination.
“We may not yet have all the detailed answers of our digital future, but one thing is clear. In 2015, we the people of Sri Lanka embarked on a progressive digitalization of our politics and governance.
“It is going to be a bumpy road – be forewarned — but there is no turning back.”
Since then, things have evolved further. In this essay, I look at how the Elections Commission, political parties, election candidates, civil society advocacy groups and individual cyber activists have used various social media tools and platforms in the run-up to, during and immediately after the Parliamentary Election.
“What role (if any) did social media play in the recently concluded General Election on 17 August 2015?
“Many are asking this question – and coming up with different answers. That is characteristic of the cyber realm: there is no single right answer when it comes to a multi-faceted and fast-evolving phenomenon like social media.
“Shortly after the Presidential Election of 8 January 2015 ended, I called it Sri Lanka’s first cyber election. That was based on my insights from over 20 years of watching and chronicling the gradual spread of information and communications technologies (ICTs) in Sri Lanka and the resulting rise of an information society.
“That was not the first time social media had figured in Lankan election campaigns. The trend started slowly some years ago, with a few tech-aware politicians and advertising agencies using websites, Facebook pages and twitter accounts for political outreach. However, such uses did not reach a ‘critical mass’ in the general and presidential elections held in 2010, or in the provincial and local government elections held thereafter.
“By late 2014, that changed significantly but this time the frontrunners were politically charged and digitally empowered citizens, not politicians or their support teams.”
The above is an extract from an op-ed I have just written and published in Daily Mirror broadsheet national newspaper in Sri Lanka (3 Sep 2015).
More hands make better democracy – but it can also lead to chaos, unless we’re careful…
Regular elections are a necessary but not a sufficient condition for a vibrant democracy. There is much more to democracy than holding free and fair elections.
The ‘sufficient conditions’ include having public institutions that allow citizens the chance to participate in political process on an on-going basis; a guarantee that all people are equal before the law (independent and apolitical judiciary); respect for cultural, ethnic and religious diversity; and freedom of opinion without fearing any repercussions. Sri Lanka has much work to do on all these fronts.
Democracy itself, as practised for centuries, can do with some ‘upgrading’ to catch up with modern information societies.
In this week’s Ravaya column, (in Sinhala, appearing in issue of 23 August 2015), I discuss methodologies that enable citizens as well as civil society organisations (CSOs) to engage with policymakers and citizen service providers on an on-going basis.
Some call it social accountability (or SAcc), and others refer to it as participatory democracy. Whatever the label, the idea is to ensure greater accountability in how the public sector manages public funds and responds to citizens’ needs.
Text of my column written for Echelon monthly business magazine, Sri Lanka, August 2015 issue
Cartoon by Awantha Artigala, Sri Lanka Cartoonist of the Year 2014
Media Reforms: The Unfinished Agenda
By Nalaka Gunawardene
When I was growing up in the 1970s, Sri Lanka’s media landscape was very different. We had only one radio station (state-owned SLBC) and three newspaper houses (Lake House, Times of Ceylon and Independent Newspapers). There was no TV, and the web wasn’t even invented.
At that time, most discussions on media freedom and reforms centred around how to contain the overbearing state – which was a key publisher, as well as the sole broadcaster, dominant advertiser and media regulator, all rolled into one.
Four decades on, the state still looms large on our media landscape, but there are many more players. The number of media companies, organisations and products has steadily increased, especially after private sector participation in broadcasting was allowed in 1992.
More does not necessarily mean better, however. Media researchers and advocacy groups lament that broadcast diversification has not led to a corresponding rise in media pluralism – not just in terms of media ownership and content, but also in how the media reflects diversity of public opinion, particularly of those living on the margins of society.
As the late Tilak Jayaratne and Sarath Kellapotha, two experienced broadcasters, noted in a recent book, “There exists a huge imbalance in both media coverage and media education as regards minorities and the marginalised. This does not come as a surprise, as it is known that media in Sri Lanka, both print and broadcast, cater mainly to the elite, irrespective of racial differences.”
Media under pressure
The multi-author book, titled Embattled Media: Democracy, Governance and Reform in Sri Lanka(Sage Publications, Feb 2015), was compiled during 2012-14 by a group of researchers and activists who aspired for a freer and more responsible media. It came out just weeks after the last Presidential Election, where media freedom and reforms were a key campaigning issue.
In their preface, co-editors William Crawley, David Page and Kishali Pinto-Jayawardena say: “Media liberalisation from the 1990s onwards had extended the range of choice for viewers and listeners and created a more diverse media landscape. But the war in the north and insurrections in the south had taken their toll of media freedoms. The island had lived under a permanent state of emergency for nearly three decades. The balance of power between government, judiciary, the media and the public had been put under immense strain.”
Embattled Media – Democracy, Governance and Reform in Sri Lanka
The book, to which I have contributed a chapter on new media, traces the evolution mass media in post-colonial Sri Lanka, with focus on the relevant policies and laws, and on journalism education. It discusses how the civil war continues to cast “a long shadow” on our media. Breaking free from that legacy is one of many challenges confronting the media industry today.
Some progress has been made since the Presidential election. The new government has taken steps to end threats against media organisations and journalists, and started or resumed criminal investigations on some past atrocities. Political websites that were arbitrarily blocked from are once again accessible. Journalists who went into exile to save their lives have started returning.
On the law-making front, meanwhile, the 19th Amendment to the Constitution recognized the right to information as a fundamental right. But the long-awaited Right to Information Bill could not be adopted before Parliament’s dissolution.
Thus much more remains to be done. For this, a clear set of priorities has been identified through recent consultative processes that involved media owners, practitioners, researchers, advocacy groups and trainers. These discussions culminated with the National Summit on Media Reforms organised by the Ministry of Media, the University of Colombo, Sri Lanka Press Institute (SLPI) and International Media Support (IMS), and held in Colombo on 13 and 14 May.
We can only hope that the next Parliament, to be elected at the August 17 general election, would take up the policy and law related aspects of the media reform agenda (while the media industry and profession tackles issues like capacity building and greater professionalism, and the education system works to enhance media literacy of everyone).
Pursuing these reforms needs both political commitment and persistent advocacy efforts.
Right to Information: The new Parliament should pass, on a priority basis, the Right to Information Bill that was finalised in May 2015 with inputs from media and civil society groups.
Media Self-Regulation: The Press Council Act 5 of 1973, which created a quasi-judicial entity called the Press Council with draconian powers to punish journalists, should be abolished. Instead, the self-regulatory body established in 2003, known as the Press Complaints Commission of Sri Lanka (PCCSL), should be strengthened. Ideally its scope should expand to cover the broadcast media as well.
Law Review and Revision: Some civil and criminal laws pose various restrictions to media freedom. These include the Official Secrets Act and sedition laws (both relics of the colonial era) and the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act that has outlived the civil war. There are also needlessly rigid laws covering contempt of court and Parliamentary privileges, which don’t suit a mature democracy. All these need review and revision to bring them into line with international standards regarding freedom of expression.
Broadcast regulation: Our radio and TV industries have expanded many times during the past quarter century within an ad hoc legal framework. This has led to various anomalies and the gross mismanagement of the electromagnetic spectrum, a finite public property. Sri Lanka urgently needs a comprehensive law on broadcasting. Among other things, it should provide for an independent body to regulate broadcasting in the public interest, more equitable and efficient allocation of frequencies, and a three-tier system of broadcasting which recognises public, commercial and community broadcasters. All broadcasters – riding on the public owned airwaves — should have a legal obligation be balanced and impartial in coverage of politics and other matters of public concern.
Restructuring State Broadcasters: The three state broadcasters – the Sri Lanka Rupavahini Corporation (SLRC), the Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC) and the Independent Television Network (ITN) – should be transformed into independent public service broadcasters. There should be legal provisions to ensure their editorial independence, and a clear mandate to serve the public (and not the political parties in office). To make them less dependent on the market, they should be given some public funding but in ways that don’t make them beholden to politicians or officials.
Reforming Lake House: Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Limited or Lake House was nationalised in 1973 to ‘broadbase’ its ownership. Instead, it has remained as a propaganda mill of successive ruling parties. Democratic governments committed to good governance should not be running newspaper houses. To redeem Lake House after more than four decades of state abuse, it needs to operate independently of government and regain editorial freedom. A public consultation should determine the most appropriate way forward and the best business model.
Preventing Censorship: No prior censorship should be imposed on the media. Where necessary, courts may review media content for their legality after publication (on an urgent basis). Laws and regulations that permit censorship should be reviewed and amended. We must revisit the Public Performance Ordinance, which empowers a state body to pre-approve all feature films and drama productions.
Blocking of Websites: Ensuring internet freedoms is far more important than setting up free public WiFi services. There should be no attempts to limit online content and social media activities contravening fundamental freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution and international conventions. Restrictions on any illegal content may be imposed only through the courts (and not via unwritten orders given by the telecom regulator). There should be a public list of all websites blocked through such judicial sanction.
Privacy and Surveillance: The state should protect the privacy of all citizens. There should be strict limits to the state’s surveillance of private individuals’ and private entities’ telephone conversations, emails and other electronic communications. In exceptional situations (e.g. crime investigations), such surveillance should only be permitted with judicial oversight and according to a clear set of guidelines.
Cartoon by Awantha Artigala, Sri Lanka Cartoonist of the Year 2014
Dealing with Past Demons
While all these are forward looking steps, the media industry as a whole also needs state assistance to exorcise demons of the recent past — when against journalists and ‘censorship by murder’ reached unprecedented levels. Not a single perpetrator has been punished by law todate.
This is why media rights groups advocate an independent Commission of Inquiry should be created with a mandate and adequate powers to investigate killings and disappearances of journalists and attacks on media organisations. Ideally, it should cover the entire duration of the war, as well as the post-war years.
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Open Minds! 