The discussion on Ujyaalo 90 was a multi-part series that brought journalists and civil society together to discuss how the media had or had not contributed to the public’s understanding of constitution-writing and federalism. The station had organized discussions in Biratnagar, Pokhara, Nepalgunj, Shuklaphanta and Kanchanpur and was broadcast nationwide on stations of the Ujyaalo 90 Network. The following paragraphs from the talk summarize both the birthing pangs of a federal Nepal and also where the media has played a supportive role in the democratization process and where it has failed.
A retired judge in Pokhara concluded that the media was still largely ‘confused’ about federalism and therefore had not been able to adequately explain what it means. A teacher at the debate added that the media had not explained what federalism entails and therefore the people had heard about federalism, but were clueless on how it would benefit them or what could be its downsides. Another comment by a female lawyer was the media first needed to be clear about federalism, and then explain why state restructuring was needed.
In a country that is trying to restructure itself based on who has been demanding what and not socioeconomic reason, or plain logic for that matter, it is true that the media has only served as loudspeakers for different groups to articulate their demands. There are various reasons for this – including the general insecurity and the underlying fears for journalists wanting to report from their hearts – some of which were articulated in the discussions: (a) The ‘mainstream’ media has not gone beyond reporting events and ‘who-said-what’, (b) Individual journalists have not been able to write/discuss possibilities beyond those advocated by the parties they are close to, and (c) Many media institutions are still controlled/influenced by different partisan interests and are more concerned about pleasing their political masters rather than objectively informing the general readership/ audiences.
Durga Bhandari, a journalist from Pokhara was on the spot while assessing what had gone wrong. She said, the media has not seriously discussed the ‘content’ of federalism – meaning the how, whys – and has only reported on who wants what. She also felt that another issue that had not been adequately discussed was how the majority would rule over minorities in the new federal units. This pointed to the little or no discussion there has been on decentralization within the federal units, which could be the only way minorities there could get the same rights that so-called ‘minorities’ (population statistics show that no single social group in Nepal has a distinct majority) are now claiming for themselves in the federal nation state.
There are no easy answers to the questions raised by the discussants but the questions themselves tell something about how the media is transforming and how useless that has been in terms of effective public information. One is the increasing requirement for journalists from their employers to “break news” every minute – 24/7 news and growing competition are reasons for this – which has taken away the time journalists could use to thoroughly study and understand the issues needed for being in a position to explain to others.
The media has not explained what federalism entails and therefore the people have heard about federalism but are clueless on how it would benefit them or what could be its downsides.
The discussions also had local Federation of Nepali Journalists (FNJ) officials participating. Generally, they seemed content with the ‘role’ the media has played in informing the people, given the general insecurity and threats that journalists have been facing. They argued that what the general public now knows about constitution-making, state building and federalism was a result of the coverage in the media. This is true because there has been little or no discussion on these issues at the local level, despite all the donor-supported projects on state building and constitution-writing that the country has had.
Some civil society participants blamed the political parties in the centre for their general lack of understanding and agreement on federalism and their preoccupation on power politics for the state of affairs. The media could have done better, but because power politics provided appropriately sized – even sensational – bytes, they also ran after the politicians when they could have focused on reminding the parties of the larger task they had left undone, and especially the agreed processes in constitution-making that they flouted with impunity.
Krishna Timilsina of the appeals court in Pokhara was particularly critical of the media’s inability to bring the parties to account when they went about announcing their own federal units when the Interim Constitution specifically suggests the process they are required to adopt for state restructuring.
Devendra Koirala, a lawyer in Biratnagar, while commending journalists for having done what they have so far – in making the term federalism fairly well-known – was also critical of their inability to point out the flaws in the propositions of the different political parties. He also touched upon an Achilles’ heel of Nepali journalism – that journalists agree or disagree with the proposals on federalism floating around based not on what could be ideal given the Nepali complexities but based on their own political affiliations.
It may be opportune to bring in some recent research findings here to examine the claims made by the media in terms of informing the public, and how that has helped the public understand federalism. Reporting on an opinion poll in 35 districts, Sudhindra Sharma and Bal Krishna Khadka wrote that only 50 percent of the respondents had heard about the term federalism (The Kathmandu Post, Dec 10, 2010). Sharma and his team have been asking the question “have you ever heard about the term federalism” in all surveys they have done since 2006.
Further, the survey also found that the most of the people had obtained their information on federalism from radio. Only 0.3 percent of the surveyed people had received the information on federalism from ‘political leaders’.
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