By Kieran Allen

A recent Irish Times front-page article was headlined ‘O Brien nets €700 –800million in Caribbean deal’. The story was written in an apparently objective style, describing how the Irish businessman will receive the money in cash while other associates such as his father Denis Snr and PJ Mara, Fianna Fail’s PR man will also make huge gains.

The tone of the article was distinctly celebratory. There was not the faintest hint that extracting this vast sum from the impoverished islands of the Caribbean might be a trifle unfair. No connections were made between O Brien’s aggressive approach to profit making and his unsavoury activities in Ireland. This, after all, is the man who in 2000 sold Esat for €2.3 billion and then avoided paying €55 million in tax by declaring himself a resident of Portugal. When some concerned citizens protested, he lashed out by saying:

‘There is too much shite going on inside Ireland at the moment. I think people are too negative towards politicians, Government, and entrepreneurs. We are fast turning into a communist state. We are fast moving towards communist doctrine.’ People in this country should be thankful for what they achieved in the last ten years. Instead I come back to Ireland and people are screaming like spoiled children. [1]

The Irish Times article was framed as another personal success story of an Irish hero. The mysterious bond of nationality, it was implied, allowed us all to bask in his glory, much like we might celebrate when our team won an international soccer match.

It would be wrong to portray this type of journalism as a conspiracy. Stories like it are a routine and their authors have internalised certain norms about how to write. However, these norms contain many unquestioned assumptions. So in a society shaped by corporations, O Brien’s success is seen as just the outcome of a ‘natural process’ of competition. Breaking from this assumption requires an active, critical and political approach. But journalists are told they should not be political because it might damage their objectivity.

But would ‘objectivity’ be really lost if journalists wrote from a particular slant? I encountered this question frequently when I served as editor of the radical newspaper, Socialist Worker.

My answer was always simple: objectivity in the sense of a desire to uncover hidden power structures is not guaranteed by staying neutral. The person who considers themselves neutral in a conflict between Denis O’Brien and the poor of the Caribbean is more likely to gloss over significant and interesting facts. By contrast, an investigative journalist who is consciously opposed to corporate interests is more likely to uncover patterns of behaviour that they want to keep hidden.

The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu once argued that all genuine social research must be subversive because it should to reveal what is hidden and sometimes repressed. Once it tries to do this, however, it will come up against dominant groups whose

“…interests are bound up with silence because they have no bones to pick with the world they dominate, which consequently appears to them as self-evident, a world that goes without saying.” [2]

Many of these sentiments could apply to investigate journalists who work either in the conventional or alternative media. For there is much to be unearthed and made visible in Ireland today.

The great irony of most modern societies is the enormous disjuncture between their official rhetoric and how actually existing capitalism functions. It is a bit like the gap between the banal language of high Soviet speak and the realities of privilege and corruption in actual Russian society before the fall.

Neo-liberal rhetoric suggests that the world is a pure market place where rugged individuals like Michael O’Leary compete unhindered by cumbersome state policies. The neo-liberals despise an ‘inefficient’ public sphere – by which they mean any space that has not been turned into a commodity, assigned a price and made subject to the ‘rigours of competition’.

The reality, however, is that the more the neo-liberals talk about global markets, the more they try to colonise the very state that they claim to despise. Modern corporations aim for a ‘frictionless’ relationship with the state so that it readily serves as their immediate handmaiden.

How else do we explain why donations from pharmaceutical and oil companies to Bush’s political clique have grown with every word spoken in praise of privatisation and de-regulation? If the state did not matter, the major US corporations would locate their headquarters in the Deep South where rent is cheaper rather than in K street Washington where they are close to the centres of political power.

These same intermeshing of the political and corporate elite is at work in Ireland but it has largely been under-investigated by the media. Let’s suggest just one area of inquiry for the subversive journalist.

Ten years ago, few people heard about the lobbying in Ireland. Yet today it has become a private industry in its own right. It is undertaken by Public Relations firms who have developed a ‘public affairs’ or lobbying function. They tend to recruit individuals who have been former members of the political elite or who have worked closely with government ministers or top party officials. These individuals are prized for the connections they can open for clients.

So Alan Dukes, the former Fine Gael Minister for Finance, for example, works as a public affairs consultant with Wilson Hartnell Public Relations and was involved in lobbying TDs about Babcock and Brown plans for the purchase of Eircom. [3] Drury Communications offers clients a range of public affairs services including, ‘putting key clients and key decision makers together’. [4] The head of this lobbying unit is Iarla Mongey who once worked closely with Mary Harney as deputy government press secretary. Q4 is another PR firm that offers a lobbying service to corporate clients. It is headed up by two former key figures within Fianna Fail – Jackie Gallagher, a former special advisor to the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and Michael Mackin, a former General Secretary of Fianna Fail. The lobbying activity of MRPA Kinman is headed up by Stephen O’Byrnes, a former key figure in the Progressive Democrats and a member of the RTE Authority. The drinks industry used this particular company particularly effectively to scupper plans to outlaw advertising of drinks to minors.

US corporations look for a little more punch and have two key lobbying agencies: The American Chamber of Commerce and the US Ambassador. The American Chamber of Commerce hosts a number of business lunches and special conferences with key decision makers. It boasts that it has ‘excellent access to Irish and European policy networks’ and can ‘keep Irish decision makers focussed on the factors that contribute to the continuing attractiveness of Ireland as a location for foreign direct investment.’ [5] The Chamber vigorously lobbied against an EU directive, which would oblige employers to consult their staff and provide them with information on issues affecting them. Instead of an automatic right to such consultation, they demanded that it could only be triggered by a written request signed by 10 percent of workers. In this way, the names of the employees might be noted by very management which was reluctant to consult them in the first place! The Irish state duly agreed and the Employees (Provision of Information and Consultation) Act bore, according to Industrial Relations News, the ‘indelible stamp’ of the American Chamber of Commerce in Ireland. [6]

The Chamber works very closely with the US Ambassador, who, it appears, intervenes extensively to lobby for US business interests. A dramatic example of the clout that this particular lobbyist yields was evident in the chewing gum affair.

In a rare moment in 2003, the former Environment Minister Martin Cullen appeared to be on the verge of imposing an extra cost on business after he was handed a consultancy report on litter. The report proposed a special €4-5 million levy on chewing gum and fast food firms and banks that used ATM machines to help bear some of the cost of cleaning up litter. The levy on chewing gum was to be raised by a 5-cent consumer tax on every packet. The justification was quite straightforward. Anyone who takes a cursory walk through the streets of any major city will find dark spots on most pavements that are the remnants of discarded chewing gum. These require special equipment to clean them off. The levy would be the chewing gum companies’ contribution to defray costs. Wrigley’s, however, approached US Ambassador James Kenny who duly set up a meeting between the company, government representatives and himself. The result was the withdrawal of the proposed levy.

When a sovereign government appears unable to impose a minor chewing gum tax, there should be concerns about the fate of its democracy. But when it is casually explained that this type of intervention is perfectly normal, one really wonders. The US embassy in Dublin explained that ‘The ambassador makes these interventions in a whole range of sectors in pursuit of US interests and on behalf of US firms. This was a just a case where the ambassador saw US interests at play and decided to get involved.’ [7] ‘US interests’ it seems are synonymous with large corporations such as Wrigleys and McDonalds.

Irish industry tends to rely on organisations such as the Construction Industry Federation and Irish Business and Employers Confederation to lobby state agencies. These have a major advantage over the unions as their members command the resources that determine whether or not investment takes places. Not only can they engage in extensive research and forward planning but they also have access to information that is normally shrouded in ‘commercial secrecy’. In a rare interview about their lobbying activities, one IBEC executive gave a glimpse of the information asymmetry which employer organisations enjoy:

“I am surprised how often they (ministerial civil servants) ring me up looking for data… Maybe it’s just a matter of us having access to several thousand members, and they (the members) trust us, so we survey them. I think we are a good source of data.” [8]

Control of information about business decisions means that IBEC lobbyists can constantly exaggerate the negative implication of any government regulation. ‘We can tell them pretty much anything – how would they know?’ is how the anonymous IBEC executive rather crudely put it.’ [9]

IBEC’s ability to scupper plans for regulation testify that there is an important grain of truth in this. At one point Ireland’s rising level of carbon dioxide emissions seemed to lead to an emerging consensus in policy making circles about the need for a carbon tax. But a negative lobbying campaign by IBEC led to its withdrawal. IBEC has also lobbied for a removal of ‘unnecessary’ planning delays on major infrastructural development – and has been rewarded with the Planning and Development (Strategic Infrastructure) Bill (2006). More broadly IBEC has consistently lobbied against ‘costly’ and ‘cumbersome’ regulation and its efforts have borne fruit with the Department of the Taoiseach’s paper on ‘Regulating Better’ which sought to reduce ‘red tape’. [10]

On major issues of economic policy, IBEC and the CIF have consistently been able to come up with initiatives that win acceptance from state officials. One of the most crucial decisions made about state services has been the formation of Public Private Partnerships. This proposal, however, originated in a joint IBEC/CIF document in April1999 which was drawn up by a committee composed of representatives of National Toll Roads, AIB, Arup Engineers and a number of legal and finance houses. Although these groups are precisely those who stood to gain commercially from these projects, their plans were accepted right down to very specific details. [11]

Most of this lobbying activity takes place behind closed doors and in an arena where ‘connections’ and ‘networking’ play a vital role. It is a de-politicised arena that is less subject to democratic scrutiny – and this is precisely why it benefits the corporations.

But surely, there is material here for our subversive journalist. What code of conduct applies to figures who move from the political sphere to the lobbying industry? How much do lobbyists get paid? What sort of access have they to politicians? Have they made donations to their electoral funds? What laws have been the result of lobbying?

But be warned. Casting a search light on hidden networks of power can carry a cost. Just before their demise, the Centre for Public Inquiry had begun to look at lobbying.

They were closed down precisely because such activity was considered dangerous. It illustrated how our rulers go to great lengths to intimidate people from investigating the truth by using financial sanctions or the laws of libels to stop them.

Don’t let that put you off, however. Any serious attempt to bring about a world whereby the people of the Caribbean rather than Denis O’Brien keep their millions will require people to stand up for their beliefs. Moreover, they can be assured of the support of many, many people who have had enough of the dictatorship of the big business.

MediaBite are proud to introduce this guest commentary from Kieran Allen, ‘In Praise of Subversion’, a challenge to any journalist who considers themselves critical of concentrations of power. Kieran Allen is lecturer in sociology at UCD and former editor of the Socialist Worker newspaper. His forthcoming book ‘The Corporate Takeover of Ireland’, examines corporate infusion into Ireland over the last decade, and is due to appear in March 2007.

1. ‘O’Brien turns his back on negative Ireland’ Irish Times 24 October 2003
2. P. Bourdieu A Science That makes Trouble in P. Bourdieu, Sociology in Question London, Sage 1993
3. ‘Dukes to lobby on behalf of B&B’ Sunday Business Post, 19 March 2003.
4. Drury Communications website www.drurycommunications.com/face_government/face1.htm.
5. American Chamber of Commerce Ireland website
6. C. Dooley, ‘US Influence on employee Bill denied’ Irish Times, 1 August 2005.
7. A. Beesley, ‘Roche gives up Chewing Gum’ Irish Times, 16 March 2003
8. P. Bernhagen, ‘Business political power, information asymmetry and structural constraints on public policy: Two cases from environmental politics and banking regulation in Germany and Great Britain’. Paper prepared for Annual national Conference of the Midwest Political Science Association 3-6 April 2003 Chicago. p. 9.
9. Ibid. p.10.
10. ‘A Chink of Light’ IBEC News May 2005
11. IBEC and CIF, Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) Briefing paper April 1999.

Geraldine Kennedy, editor of the Irish Times is surely serious when she says her newspaper’s role is to ‘shape public opinion’ – if its coverage of the fortunes of “Professor” Gerry Wrixon is anything to go by.  In another of the IT’s articles on behalf of the controversial Professor Wrixon, now ex President of UCC, the paper has again put a gloss on the latest developments in the ongoing saga of events at University College Cork.  This time around, the occasion for their enthusiasm on Wrixon’s behalf is the report by John Malone, appointed last year by UCC’s governing body at the behest of Minister for Education, Mary Hanafin, to investigate allegations of bullying and corruption.  Bizarrely, until now, the Irish Times has failed ever to report the fact of this investigation – a strange omission by our foremost national newspaper in the public record of disturbing events at a significant national institution.

Background

The allegations against Professor Wrixon and others were raised most notably by Professor Des Clarke in a lengthy memo circulated to every member of staff at the university last summer.  Former UCC President Michael Mortell, among others, was sufficiently troubled to write to the Irish Examiner, supporting Clarke in his request for a proper investigation into UCC’s affairs. (1)  Clarke’s memo itself followed the publication of other critical news reports, including some by this author on Indymedia.ie and who declares a personal interest.

The furore resulting from all this seemed to have finally compelled Minister Hanafin to take the matter seriously where all previous attempts had failed.  However, that turned out, unsurprisingly it must be said, to be too good to be true.  Despite the serious nature of the allegations against Wrixon and the mountain of evidence which his critics say exist to prove them, the first sign that matters were once again to be hushed up was when Hanafin declared, in defiance of legal logic “I think appointing a visitor at this stage would be taking the allegations too seriously, given that they were disputed two years ago. But I don’t want it to come back again in another two years.”  (2)

A copy of Professor Clarke’s memo is available at the link provided beneath this article. (3) There will surely be few readers who will consider his concerns not to be very serious indeed.   Hanafin’s statement in itself, was pretty incontrovertible evidence of a foregone conclusion as to the veracity of the claims:   “They’re about Gerry Wrixon but they’re also about finances and about spending of money on buildings, therefore it could be very easily cleared up,” she was reported to have added. (2)

Independent Investigation?

The next sign that matters were continuing along the same path that had led to the disharmony in the first place was when Minister Hanafin announced the appointment of an independent investigator whose ‘independence’ was questionable in the opinion of many people.  In what might best be described as a knight’s move, Minister Hanafin and the HEA allowed UCC to appoint its own investigator and frame the remit of the investigation. The appointment was subsequently made by Governing Body Chairman, Enda McDonagh and presented to the rest of the Governing Body –  after the fact and without discussion.

The Irish Independent:

“UCC Governing Body chairperson Professor Enda McDonagh recommended Mr Malone in a letter to members of the body on Friday, in which he sought agreement to the appointment by 10am yesterday. Prof McDonagh expressed regret that he would not be contactable “over the next day or so” and said that no reply would be taken as consent. The professor stressed the challenge involved in identifying someone of stature, with the relevant expertise, who had no connection with UCC, to conduct the investigation.” (4)

(John Malone is a former General Secretary of the Department of Agriculture. He came to public prominence in obtaining 100 per cent public financing of the 15 million euro Equestrian Centre at Punchestown Racecourse, fast-tracked by Finance Minister Charlie McCreevy and Agriculture Minister Joe Walsh. In evidence to the Dáil Public Accounts Committee on 17/12/2003, John Malone said the Centre was never intended to hold show jumping events, in flat contradiction to his earlier contention that the absence of such a centre was the reason for the loss of the World Equestrian Games in 1999.   The Comptroller and Auditor General, John Purcell, said it would be hard to conclude the centre was providing a vital function in the agri-equestrian area.)

The remit of the investigation was to be determined by the governing body of UCC, the very group about to whom many of the allegations were related.   In effect, the defendants were allowed to determine what they should be accused of.  Naturally enough, they decided that none of the really tricky stuff would be considered.  Out of approximately 50 heads of complaint, it seems that about three were deemed appropriate for investigation.  A call was made for all parties with outstanding grievances to contact Mr Malone.  But when Dr Stuart Neilson, for example, approached him with the details of his experiences of alleged bullying at UCC he was told that the matter was outside the scope of the investigation.  The Irish Independent noted on the 22nd December 2006:

“After the selection of Prof Murphy [Wrixon’s successor] the governors spent an hour and a half discussing a report into the bullying allegations. The Irish Independent understands that a motion was carried stating the governing body was unable to progress matters further and felt it had no option but to dismiss the complaints on the basis only of non-engagement by the three complainants – who have rejected a committee investigating their allegations. It is understood that at least one of the three is seriously considering legal action. The other two are also expected to consider their options.” (5)

Having at first welcomed Minister Hanafin’s interest in the situation, the prejudicial nature of the investigation resulted in the refusal of many people, including Professor Des Clarke to cooperate with it.  What confidence could have been felt in a process which amounted, in effect, to the setting up of a kangaroo court by the very body against whom the allegations were made?  Undaunted by the inevitable failure of her strategy for resolving the situation constructively, the Minister nevertheless pressed ahead with her plans without apparent concern for the further insult and anger that it caused to many people.  In September 2006, the Irish Times had eagerly reported that:

“…many of the allegations made by Prof Des Clarke of financial mismanagement at UCC had been made before and it referred them to the HEA which in turn referred them to the UCC’s governing body, which had found them to be groundless.   President Wrixon has said that “there isn’t a single instance where any of the allegations he has made have found the university has acted wrongly in any way” and that “these views have already been expressed to the governing body, Government ministers and State agencies, and been found to have no merit” and that he would not highlight all the “factual errors” in Prof Clarke’s letter.”  (6)

This translates into nothing more than saying that President Wrixon has said there is no need for a proper investigation.  Well, he would, wouldn’t he?   But the Times just left it at that – no supporting evidence was offered for Wrixon’s claims.  Of course, any competent enquiry would have quickly revealed the ‘factual errors’ in his own or anyone else’s version of events.  Nevertheless, both the Irish Times and Minister Hanafin have so far evidently taken him at his own word – both seemingly determined not to look at any evidence that would prevent them from shaping public opinion in favour of Professor Wrixon.  And let’s not forget what is at stake here: a university college massively in debt; a divided and unhappy institution and many outstanding grievances among people who believe they were treated with exceptional contempt by the university – and now by the Minister for Education herself  –  for challenging corruption, bullying and mismanagement.

Again, it fell to the Independent to provide us with some counterweight opinion on the nature of the ‘independent investigation’:

“Prof Clarke made clear his unhappiness with the latest development in the saga, including the time given to members of the governing body to consider and agree Mr Malone’s name. ‘The Governing Body is appointing a consultant to write a report about itself; the scope is limited by excluding all the matters that the Governing Body ‘considered’ but failed to investigate.’ The appointee has no independent legal powers, no brief to investigate anything, is paid by the Governing Body and the Higher Education Authority (HEA), gets secretarial support from UCC, and is asked to report within a few weeks.” (7)

Reporting The Report

This brings us to the central point of MediaBite’s concern with the affair.  The investigator, presumably, has apparently seen fit to provide the Irish Times with an early copy of the report before the university’s own officers have had a chance to see it or comment on what it says.  Did the Minister agree to that?  This turn of events may not be unrelated to the fact that the newly constituted governing body at UCC under President John Murphy, takes over from the old body on the 19th of February.  The Wrixon camp, which will include many of his supporters on the old governing body, will clearly have been keen to secure favourable publicity for themselves ahead of the report’s official publication date –  said to be this coming Tuesday the 6th February. And the Irish Times has, it seems, been happy to oblige.  On the 30th of January in the ‘Teacher’s Pet’ column, clearly equipped with advance information, the IT was in a position to begin the process of  ‘shaping’ the public perception of what Malone’s report would say:

“Broadly, the report will be welcomed by the Wrixonites. There is some mild criticism of the manner in which the governing authority was by-passed on some decisions.” (8)

To anyone who has been following the Wrixon saga from other perspectives, the IT account of the report makes the same depressingly familiar reading.   It conforms almost exactly to about a hundred earlier flattering items and articles in the same paper and to Wrixon’s apparent view of himself as the messiah of UCC and the Irish university world at large. It also claims that “The inquiry examined over 50 allegations made by Prof Des Clarke of UCC in a letter to Ms Hanafin” (9) but it patently did not investigate all of them, because they had excluded potential litigation, the bullying complaints and all matters previously considered by the governing body itself. In other words, most of the issues that Professor Clarke raised were actually ignored beyond the decision not to investigate them.  The word ‘examined’ is the critical one in the account above.  The complaints were ‘examined’ but not investigated.  In his analysis of the report in the IT, Sean Flynn, Education Editor, summarised the conclusion of the report as follows:

“There was a very strong focus on results and implementing change but much less on people affected by these changes….” (9)

This has been the refrain from the Wrixon camp over the last few years.  Nobody at UCC has been troubled by the fact of ‘change’.  The closing down of a highly successful and internationally renowned research centre might possibly be one of the ‘changes’ which Wrixon supporters are talking about.  For a university that was spiralling into debt at the time, it was a questionable business decision and the closure appeared to be grounded more in ideological preferences than any concern with modernisation or change. From an academic perspective, it was inexplicable.

And which ‘results’ was the President truly focused on?  We know that, personally, he has done handsomely well out of the sale of Farran Technologies – a company the full extent of whose links to the UCC sponsored NMRC (National Microelectronic Research Centre) are of unknown provenance. On the other hand UCC itself is estimated to be in debt to the tune of between 60 and 100 million Euro.  If Wrixon were the director of a company, the shareholders would likely have long since sought his resignation.  Certainly a lot of shiny new buildings have materialised as a consequence of private sector donations but it is not clear what foothold in UCC’s teaching and research activities those donors have secured for themselves as a consequence of their largesse.   Where public money is concerned – and this is the most crucial aspect of university management – the UCC deficit is more than the whole of all the state’s other university colleges combined.  On top of that Wrixon has left a divided and unhappy institution behind him.  The fact that there is a general increase in the number of people wanting to attend all third level institutions is hardly down to Professor Gerry Wrixon but he is apparently unabashed at claiming the credit for the phenomenon as it relates to UCC for himself, nevertheless.   The Irish Times is well aware of all of these facts and yet it consistently chooses to ignore them in most of its coverage of the issue. Moreover, the paper has effectively refused on a number of occasions to hear evidence and other information offered to it by member’s of UCC staff – an extraordinary situation for a paper pretending to be concerned with serious investigative journalism.

From the point of view of media coverage, it is interesting to contrast the summary of Malone’s report offered by Niall Murray in the Irish Examiner on the 3rd February.  He begins his article with the following:

“PERSONAL mistrust and animosity were common at management level in University College Cork during Professor Gerry Wrixon’s presidency, an inquiry carried out for UCC’s governing body revealed.” (10)

From Murray’s piece it is clear that the report carries rather more criticism of Professor Wrixon than Flynn’s item in the Irish Times would lead anyone to believe, although Murray too confirms the central thrust of Malone’s ‘findings’ to be supportive of Professor Wrixon’s ‘vision’.  However, given all that is known about the context in which the report was conducted, the weighting in favour of Wrixon which the Irish Times has given to its conclusions is worrying.  The paper’s reporting of the affair throughout its dragging history can only have played a major part in exacerbating the mistrust and anger felt by many at UCC.  What the effect on UCC staff and management of its coverage of the latest report will be, remains to be seen.  Readers of the IT should in any case be aware that what they are reading may not at all be a full and fair account of all perspectives on a given situation.  Given her stated philosophy, is it not the case that Irish Times reports are more likely to be a presentation of selected facts as Geraldine Kennedy would prefer you to see them?

Miriam Cotton
Editor
MediaBite
February 5th 2007
1. Irish Examiner 29/09/2006: Ex-UCC president calls for mismanagement claim probe http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/2006/09/29/story14571.asp

2. Irish Examiner 14/10/2006: Hanafin to ‘clear up’ UCC debt allegations
http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/2006/10/14/story15793.asp

3. Indymedia: An open letter from Professor Desmond Clarke to President Wrixon
http://www.indymedia.ie/article/78749#comment169636

4. Irish Independent 15/11/2006: Questions over investigator inflame college controversy
http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1723910&issue_id=14890

5. Irish Independent 22/12/2006: College rejects bullying claims by staff
http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=50&si=1745837&issue_id=15039

6. Irish Times 30/09/2006: UCC complaints referred to HEA
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/ireland/2006/0930/1158591216121.html

7. Irish Independent 15/11/2006: Questions over investigator inflame college controversy
http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1723910&issue_id=14890

8. Irish Times 30/01/2007: A new era begins at UCC later this week when Michael Murphy takes over from Gerry Wrixon in the president’s office
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/education/2007/0130/1169680961452.html

9. Irish Times 02/02/2007: Inquiry clears ex-UCC head of corruption
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/ireland/2007/0202/1170363380048.html

10. 03/02/2007: Report highlights ‘mistrust and animosity’ at UCC
http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/2007/02/03/story24593.asp

11.  18/09/2006:  ‘Wrixon + 8 Million: UCC – 60 Million
http://www.indymedia.ie/article/78472

Update:

In September 2006 MediaLens issued a Media Alert examining the UK media’s abject silence on the violence that has consumed Haiti since the “military coup that forced Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide into exile on February 29, 2004 .” [1]

A study published in August 2006 by the Lancet “found that during the 22-month post-Aristide period of the US-backed Interim Government, 8,000 people were murdered in the greater Port-au Prince area of Haiti alone, giving Haiti’s government one of the worst human rights records in the hemisphere. 22 per cent of the killings were committed by the Haitian National Police (HNP), 26 per cent by the demobilised army or armed anti-Aristide groups and 48 per cent by criminals.” [Ibid]

We wrote to RTE at the time to ask why they had failed to cover the report. The answer was predictable, ‘contention’ rose it’s ugly head, again:

“As [you] are probably aware, the Lancet has been investigating allegations that this report may have been misleading. They have received complaints questioning the findings – especially in relation to the role of the Lavalas groups, and the figures for the number of sexual attacks and murders.” [Michael Good, Email 22/09/06]

It is now over 5 months since this study was published, and Haiti has been mentioned just twice since then by RTE:

“Almost half of the world’s countries – 49% – are not stable enough for business to operate in. Control Risks, an international business risk consultancy, says 96 out of 198 countries posed a medium, high or extreme political risk. This means that at best, businesses there are likely to face disruption. In worst case scenarios, they find that find the state is actively hostile towards them.

The most politically hostile countries for business include Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Liberia, Cuba, Haiti , and Bolivia.” [2]

“Digicel, the Caribbean mobile company owned by Denis O’Brien, says it has over four million subscribers – twice as many as last year- and has invested $1.5 billion in the region…After launching in Haiti last year it said its customer base has reached one million there. In 2006 Digicel also launched services in Trinidad & Tobago, Turks & Caicos and Bonaire.” [3]

Should it come as a surprise that this support of business success in an “actively hostile” state should trump the deaths of 8,000 people?

We wrote again to Mr. Good on the 8th February:

Dear Mr. Good, [Email, 08/02/07]

Further to our exchange last year regarding violence in Haiti, the Lancet have published the findings of it’s investigation into the ‘contentious’ Haiti Report. The findings vindicate the authors and the report. Please find a copy attached below. I trust there are no other objections to reporting the findings.

Best wishes,

David Manning

The Lancet

The Lancet, London NW1 7BY , UK

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

6 The Lancet, Information for authors, http://www.thelancet.com/authors/lancet/authorinfo , (accessed Jan 24, 2007),

As yet we have received no response.

1.http://www.medialens.org/alerts/06/060911
haiti_the_traditional.php
2. ttp://www.rte.ie/business/2006/1107/controlrisk.html
3. ttp://www.rte.ie/business/2007/0109/digicel.html

Below is the previous correspondence with RTE News Editor Michael Good on this issue:

Dear Mr. Good, [Email, 22/09/06]

It is now over three weeks since that damning report detailing human rights abuses in Haiti was published in the peer reviewed medical journal The Lancet. There has yet been no mention of it in the Irish media. Are we to wait until it reaches the agenda of a politician before it is deemed worthy of reporting?

Please find attached below my original email and one I sent to the Irish Times.

Thank you for your time.

Regards,

Dear Mr. Good, [Email, 13/09/06]

A study conducted by the Wayne State University school of social work in Detroit Michigan in 2005 of human rights abuses in Haiti since the ousting of democratically-elected President Jean Bertrand Aristide was published in the British medical journal The Lancet last month. The study has received surprisingly little attention given the disturbing picture it paints of life in Haiti since the US backed coup. Among the figures:

8,000 people were murdered in the greater Port-au Prince area of Haiti alone

[22 per cent of the killings were committed by the Haitian National Police (HNP), 26 per cent by the demobilised army or armed anti-Aristide groups, 48 per cent by criminals]

35,000 women and girls were raped or sexually assaulted

[more than half of the victims were children]

The findings are particularly unwelcome for those countries who actively engaged in ‘disturbing’ the democratic process by forcibly removing President Aristide, as the figures show a sizable proportion of attacks were conducted by political groups with ‘Western’ support. This however should not impede RTE in reporting the facts.

I hope you can find time to address this issue.

Yours sincerely,

David Manning

For more information on the report please see:

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/08/31/144231

http://www.medialens.org/alerts/index.php

Dear Ms. Kennedy,

It is now two weeks since the Lancet medical journal published the findings of a study which examined human rights abuses in Haiti since the ousting of democratically-elected President Jean Bertrand Aristide. Only a handful of news outlets have bothered to report on the findings, though this should come as little surprise to those that have followed events in Haiti since the US backed coup of two years ago.

UK based media watch organisation Media Lens, in monitoring the media’s reporting of Haiti’s human rights situation, have revealed a remarkable trend. Prior to the ousting of President Aristide the British and US media published many articles about the human rights situation in Haiti in order to vilify a leader, unpopular with the US, Canadian and French governments.

Yet following the ‘forced exile’ of President Aristide there followed large scale human rights abuses in Haiti which have gone unreported in the media. The most blatant example of this silence is the lack of coverage of this study’s shocking findings: ” 8,000 people were murdered in the greater Port-au Prince area of Haiti alone,” many by anti-Aristide groups, also, “35,000 women and girls were raped or sexually assaulted, more than half of the victims were children.”

In failing to report the dire situation in Haiti the liberal media walks a fine line between inexplicable silence and complicity.

Yours etc…

Dear Mr. Manning, [Email, 22/09/06]

Thank you for your recent letter concerning the Lancet report on human rights abuses in Haiti.

As are probably aware, the Lancet has been investigating allegations that this report may have been misleading. They have received complaints questioning the findings – especially in relation to the role of the Lavalas groups, and the figures for the number of sexual attacks and murders.

However, all parties do appear to accept that the level of violence and sexual assaults in Haiti is disturbingly high.

We will continue to monitor the situation in Haiti with a view to returning to this story in the near future.

Regards,

Michael Good

Dear Mr. Good, [Email, 25/09/06]

Apologies for my delayed response.

As far as I am aware the complaint regards the use of one of the coordinators names and does not question ‘the figures for the number of sexual attacks and murders’, this confusion has been exploited by the media in order to undermine the the study by speculating on the political motivations of the coordinator. However, neither the Lancet’s investigation, nor the complaint, question the validity of the study’s core findings.

“It is not suggested that the Lancet report had misreported its findings or that Ms Kolbe had any other agenda than the welfare of ordinary Haitians at heart. It is accepted by all parties that the study’s core findings – that there have been disturbingly high levels of violence and sexual abuse in Haiti in that period – are true and need to be urgently addressed by the Haitian government and other bodies.” [1]

It is alleged that this coordinator, in ‘failing’ to clearly state that she had worked at an orphanage founded by Mr. Aristide, has attempted to disguise her political association. This insinuation is then used to suggest this ‘undisclosed’ favour may have coloured the findings, so as to cast a more favourable light on pro-Lavalas groups.

Yet, “Prior to beginning research, [the study’s coordinators] received written permission from Latortue’s [Prime Minister of Haïti] administration to conduct the study. We fully informed the government of our intentions to research human-rights abuses and of Athena Kolbe’s background as a journalist writing under her mother’s maiden name, as well as the volunteering she did with orphans in Port-au-Prince.” [Exert from a letter to the Miami Herald from the study’s coordinators, Royce Hutson and Athena Kolbe, attached in full below] [2]

It appears, this relatively inconsequential issue has been exploited in order to cast doubt on the findings, which do not support the ‘complainants’ contention. Therefore there is some reason to believe the speculation is politically motivated.

“The main reason why I doubt this finding is that it contradicts the information that I have received from independent human rights investigators working in some of the most violent areas of Port-au-Prince…I have some doubts about the credibility of the research with regard to the perpetrators of these acts. These doubts focus on the contention that very few of the human rights violations have been attributed to “Lavalas members or partisans” (by which I assume the authors mean members or partisans of the Lavalas Family party led by Jean-Bertrand Aristide).” [Exert from a letter from Charles Arthur to the Lancet] [3]

Though the ‘contention’ has been extensively examined: “The publisher of the Lancet, Richard Horton, said the study had come with excellent credentials and peer reviews. “It was very thoroughly reviewed by four external advisers,” he said.”

The investigation into this complaint by the Lancet, which I might add has received more publicity than the actual study, is presumably standard procedure for a peer reviewed scientific journal.

As I pointed out before, the results of the study and the level of violence depicted in Haiti is not disputed. And while it is unalarming that such a study should be treated with hostility in the mainstream press, it is shameful that the media would choose not to report the findings, and in the case of the Guardian, for instance, focus on the unsubstantiated allegations.

There remains several options open to the media; firstly, ignore the existence of the study in compliant fashion, secondly, report the findings of the report, but choose to focus on the unfounded insinuations, or thirdly, report the findings and also the complaint, while ensuring that appropriate weighting is assigned to each.

If the purpose of the media is to provide adequate and accurate information in order to afford citizens the means to maintain democratic institutions, then refraining from reporting such findings amounts to a conscious attempt to hinder that process.

While the ‘complainant’ and those that conducted the study have much common ground, in that they both have the interests of Haitians at heart, the media has cynically used this issue to bury the report. Much of the responsibility for the human rights abuses detailed in this study falls at the feet of those that supported the 2004 coup, namely, France, the US, and Canada. The reason they were able to conduct this operation with little resistance from their citizens is that the media has consistently and continually failed to report the situation in Haiti.

Regards,

David

1. http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/

2. http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news

3. http://www.medialens.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1842

Haitian-abuse study legitimate

Re Gerard Latortue’s Sept. 9 letter, Kurzban column gets it wrong: We were surprised to see Latortue’s attack on our study, which estimates that 8,000 murders and 35,000 sexual assaults — half against children — were committed during his tenure as Haiti’s interim prime minister.

Prior to beginning research, we received written permission from Latortue’s administration to conduct the study.

We fully informed the government of our intentions to research human-rights abuses and of Athena Kolbe’s background as a journalist writing under her mother’s maiden name, as well as the volunteering she did with orphans in Port-au-Prince.

Using Random GPS Coordinate Sampling, we surveyed 1,260 households accounting for 5,720 individuals and found extensive violations by Latortue’s interim-government forces. More than 20 percent of the murders and 13 percent of the sexual assaults were attributed to government-security agents. Had Latortue had any questions about our credibility, his administration should not have authorized the study.

Latortue’s claim that we were ”discredited” is false. The Lancet’s editor has publicly stated that the study’s findings are not under dispute. The journal’s only concern is with tangential issues regarding the use of one of our names. Neither of the researchers was ever a member nor paid employee of any Haitian entity or political party. Volunteering to do child care and teach communications classes at an orphanage’s youth radio station 10 years ago is not a conflict of interest, either by academic ethics or by common sense.

ROYCE HUTSON and ATHENA KOLBE, assistant professor and research assistant, Wayne State University School of Social Work, Detroit

Review of ‘Guardians of Power’ by David Edwards and David Cromwell

The Village
by David Manning
Thursday, May 25, 2006

Guardians of Power is a must-read for anyone who consumes media. Not only does it identify inaccurate reporting, it explains the influences at work on journalists and media outlets. David Manning reviews the book and puts the Irish media under the microscope

It is unusual to agree with everything one reads in their daily newspaper and there are a number of obvious reasons why this is true. The most glaring of which is the fact your daily newspaper cannot be tailored to one person. It must appeal to a wide audience and provide information relating to topics and issues that either do not affect you or, more commonly, do not interest you. Newspapers are obliged to create certain revenue in order to sustain themselves, generally by retaining a high level of readership and allocating space to advertising. This is of course trivial, but not irrelevant.

Guardians of Power, by David Edwards and David Cromwell, puts the news media under the microscope, analysing the sources of inaccurate and biased reporting. It examines the role of advertising and the influence of government in shaping coverage. It aims not only to identify these inaccuracies, but to explain their existence and outline ways you, as a media consumer, can correct this distorted version of reality.

In addressing this apparent distortion, the writers chose not to go after relatively soft targets such as the tabloid news, instead directing their efforts towards well-respected ‘liberal’ news outlets such as the Guardian, the Independent and the BBC. The writers dub these institutions, the self-styled bastions of liberality, ‘Guardians of Power’.

They owe much to the work of Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky, in particular the influential book Manufacturing Consent – The Political Economy of the Mass Media. The Propaganda Model defined within forms a clinical basis for the writers’ description of the news media. This perception is convincingly supported within Guardians of Power not just by the persuading writing and painstakingly researched facts, but by the sometimes illuminating and sometimes enraging responses of media insiders. These responses and debates form by far the most gripping portions of the book, raising questions not only of distortion but of the journalists’ own motives in communicating publicly with what is essentially an organisation at odds with the corporate entity the journalists represent.

Edwards and Cromwell identify a recognisable servility to power in much of the reporting examined, a servility that requires statements by those in power to be taken at face value, to be contained within quotation marks if too controversial to report as fact. There are obvious exceptions to this rule, for example if the power in question is that of an official enemy. Therefore the accusations of US meddling by a leftist leader of a South American regime, Hugo Chavez, are always reported as such, whereas the US response generally carries more weight. Historical precedence is rarely, if ever, used to support the rhetoric of blacklisted South American socialists. At the same time Western politicians are rarely criticised using the same scathing language, unless they have fallen foul of the real decision-makers, i.e. those on their way out or those that have simply made mistakes that are impossible to bury.

Leaders such as Tony Blair are generally portrayed as loveable rogues, who are sometimes forced to circumvent laws for the public good. A simple example, showing this trait is not restricted to UK media, is Frank Miller in the Irish Times who recently summed up the British prime minister’s character: “He is of course a terrible chancer. However, that doesn’t mean he isn’t sometimes justified.”

This inability to criticise government has been evidenced over and over, with little exception. When one does encounter dissent in the ranks we rarely see the same venomous prose seemingly reserved for official enemies. In 2002 the Independent’s Richard Lloyd Parry described Indonesia’s invasion of East Timor 27 years earlier as a case of “international thuggery” – an amazingly civil description of genocide, which belies the reality of the crime. A radio call for help was heard at the time of the invasion: “Soldiers are killing indiscriminately. Women and children are being shot in the streets. We are all going to be killed. I repeat, we are all going to be killed.”

The book focuses on a number of important events over the last decade but it is in their dissection of the media’s constant revaluation of historical events that the writers reveal the most damning evidence of the media’s conformity to the Propaganda Model, in particular, the near uniform change in account of Iraq’s weapons inspector’s departure. Where they were once ‘withdrawn’, it is now reported they were ‘thrown out’.

Many events discussed within the book impact the important decisions we are involved in today. With Ireland helping to facilitate the liberation of Iraq, the media’s responsibility to put this venture in perspective is clear. Quotation’s from the likes of the New York Times’ Thomas Friedman, an overt backer of the Iraq war during the 1999 bombing of Serbia, should not be forgotten. “Like it or not, we are at war with the Serbian nation and the stakes have to be very clear: Every week you ravage Kosovo is another decade we will set your country back by pulverising you. You want 1950? We can do 1950. You want 1389? We can do 1389 too.” Although this sort of warmongering is not typical, this generalisation of whom and what ‘we’ are fighting is often employed. For instance, the political tide turning against Iran is always framed as the West versus some sort of lunacy. The solution is officially ‘diplomatic’, however, if this fails, Iran can expect sanctions or military aggression. What is rarely mentioned is that the people most likely to suffer are the poorest Iranians, not the Iranian government. War with Iran is not, as it is framed, a fight against hardliners or terrorists. It is war to be waged against civilians. Just as we have seen in Iraq, sanctions and conflict have claimed more lives in the past 15 years than they were officially designed to save.

The book also focuses on the language employed by the media. So British forces will ‘go after’ and ‘take out’ the enemy, while the enemy is generally depicted as indiscriminate killers who, for instance, “sprayed the checkpoint with bullets” (according to a BBC report in late April 2006). This echoes the language used by US officials in their quest to “go after the terrorists” and “take down the Taliban”. The absurdity of this language in neutral reporting is only apparent when we apply it to official enemies: “Iraqi forces are deploying across southern Iraq, where they will conduct an intensive campaign designed to go after and take down coalition strongholds.” Mark Steyn in the Irish Times wrote last year: “There are millions of Americans who take the view that there’s no such thing as a bad reason to whack Saddam.” While this may be true and the language gung-ho, Saddam remains well and truly alive, while thousands of Iraqis and coalition troops have suffered said “whacking”.

The liberal media prides itself on its ability to remain impartial and free from bias. This objectivity is the backbone of a medium that regards itself as the Fourth Estate. However, this impartiality lapses on occasion and reveals a worrying subordination to power. BBC Political Editor Andrew Marr had one such lapse while describing Tony Blair’s metamorphosis as Baghdad fell to coalition troops. “It would be entirely ungracious, even for his critics, not to acknowledge that today he stands as a larger man and a stronger prime minster as a result.” This indignant outburst is at odds with his conscious interpretation of a journalist’s role in his book: “Gavin Hewitt, John Simpson, Andrew Marr and the rest are employed to be studiously neutral, expressing little emotion and certainly no opinion.”

The discrepancy between how Marr perceives journalism and what he actually outputs evidences more than just a lack of perspective, it is a prime example of the qualities a journalist requires to attain the success of editor at an institution such as the BBC. Marr’s own obliviousness to the bias he frequents is revealed clearly in an interview with Noam Chomsky in 1996. Marr asked, “How can you know that I’m self-censoring? How can you know that journalists are…” Chomsky replied, “I don’t say you’re self-censoring – I’m sure you believe everything you’re saying – but what I’m saying is, if you believed something different, you wouldn’t be sitting where you’re sitting.”

Finally, the media’s conflicting portrayal of the elections of official enemies and those conducted by their own government or its allies is another savage example of media bias which clearly shows the media’s lack of continuity with regard to what constitutes democracy, the very institution the liberal media has appointed itself guardian of. In 2005 the media chorus hailed the Iraqi elections an “astonishing testimony to the power of democracy”, while in the same year the media described elections in Zimbabwe as “stealing democracy” even though a similar formula for unfair and un-free elections existed in both countries.

Guardians of Power focuses almost exclusively on the British news media, but the Irish news media is not exempt from the self-imposed restrictions of the Propaganda Model. If you want to reconcile what you read in the media with what happens in reality this book is essential reading.

http://www.villagemagazine.ie/article.asp?sid=10&sud=49&aid=1859