Only half of the six million Papua New Guineans have access to the media and the wealth of information that could assist them to make informed decisions and improve their lifestyles.
U.S. Ambassador to PNG Leslie Rowe issued the challenge during the PNG Media Council awards presentation night at the Hideaway Hotel on Saturday.
Rowe said the geographical difficulties in PNG meant media access was available to only half of the people. “But what about the other 50 percent?” she asked.
“I challenge the media to work with the government and private enterprises to increase media coverage and make it accessible to the other 50 percent who do not have access to the newspaper, radio or television,” she said.
Rowe said the media in PNG was in some ways like a university of ideas for a broad spectrum of society, providing a forum to debate key issues affecting the country like economic and social development, HIV/ AIDS, climate change and more.
She reiterated that the role of the media was to preserve the public’s right to know which remained at the core of a free press philosophy and guided the way the media conducted itself, particularly in relations to the government.
“The media has the responsibility to keep the people informed about government activities — both negative and positive — thereby sparking debate. But in preserving the public trust, the media has a role to be responsible and abide by journalism ethics,” she said.
The president of the Media Council of PNG, Joe Kanekane, said the journalism awards night now included the private sector and particularly civil society which had contributed a lot to developing the industry.
“We recognize the changes and challenges in the industry and must work together to address them,” Kanekane said, adding that previously there was primarily a mainstream focus but now there were many community newspapers and local radio stations, including a local television.
He challenged young journalists in the industry to recognize the benchmarks set by previous journalists and improve on these. He described the media sector as being static and reiterated the need to keep up with regional and global changes.
