News from Fiji
Suva, FijiI slands
16 February 2006 - 11am
Fiji Media Watch, today, in partnership with the Pacific regional coordinators of the 2005 Global Media Monitoring Project, femLINKPACIFIC (Media Initiatives for Women), presented to representatives of the newsmedia in Fiji, as well as the Pacific Islands News Association, their copies of WHO MAKES THE NEWS?, the report of the 2005 Global Media Monitoring Project. Also present was the Director of the Ministry of Women (Fiji) Maria Matavewa and the General Secretary of the Soqosoqo Vakamarama I Taukei, Adi Finau Tabakaucoro:
"Endorsed by both the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the "Who Makes the News?" campaign aims to promote gender equality in the media by challenging the news media to take substantial and immediate action to ensure that they represent women and men in a fair and balanced way. This is exactly one year since hundreds of gender and media groups in 76 countries joined in an effort of incredible solidarity to monitor the representation of women and men in their news media as part of the Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP) 2005. The GMMP 2005 results unfortunately show that the marginalization of women in the news media is still very much a reality."
Fiji Media Watch, coordinated the monitoring of the news in Fiji: “One year ago to this day, a group of individuals came together at the FCOSS building…our news was under the microscope,” related Peter Emberson, Vice President of Fiji Media Watch, who worked closely with FMW Coordinator, Violet Savu to compile and analyze the Fiji news on the day. The three daily newspapers, the 1pm English radio news bulletin of Fiji Broadcasting Corporation and Fijian language news bulletin of Viti FM (Communications Fiji Limited) were monitored, together with the 6pm and 10pm newscasts on Fiji Television: “There were 94 news items and 272 people (news actors, subjects, and people making the news). This was what we analyzed altogether. That’s the number of stakeholders in the news on that day (in Fiji)”, said Emberson.
Emberson explained to the news media representatives, the process and also displayed the 120 page report which is a culmination of 3 volunteer teams of “media monitors”, 10 individuals from 3 organizations, who invested up to 8 hours to prepare the monitoring report which was then analyzed by Savu and Emberson, following the GMMP coding and qualitative analysis guidelines, which led into the presentation of “who made the news” on the day in Fiji:
“In Fiji, 49% of the population is women, but only 20% of the people featured in the news are women. And it is the same the world over,” said Emberson, “20% includes those who work in the news, those who present the news and the subjects of the news. It is predominantly a male scenario that you are looking at.” Emberson noted the 3% increase from the 2000 GMMP report.
“Our findings indicate that in television only 11% of women feature as news subjects while radio reflects 17%. However, newspapers show the highest representation of women being 31%,” said Emberson, noting that the nature of newspapers allows for greater allocation of stories for one day.
Men’s voices also continue to dominate the ‘hard news’, said Emberson, although he noted that in the Fiji analysis, however, men also featured predominantly in the celebrity category on the day: “We are telling stories about men in the news; we see the predominant role that men play for expert commentary, as eye-witnesses, popular opinion; as news subjects it is predominantly male. It is pretty much a slice of what happens every day, in the news,” he added
As far as the portrayal of women as a victim or survivor, the Fiji findings highlight that women continue to be featured as victims: “On monitoring day, women represented 20% of those portrayed as victims, whereas men represented 15%.” The report reiterates that the ‘victim stereotype’ continues to be perpetuated when coverage is offered to women, even though, women are also offering solutions to situations, such as on issues relating to peace and human security:
“By closeting us into this victim mentality, makes it very hard to then draw women out of a situation and engage with them as decision makers, as these perpetuate all the other institutional barriers, we have to contend with,” said Bhagwan-Rolls.
In relation to reporters contrary to global trends, women appear to be at the forefront of hard news journalism, according to the Fiji findings: “In Fiji, more women are covering politics and government issues, no women were covering arts and celebrity news on the day. So it is pretty heartening, to know that women are taking on more serious reporting, on areas of concern, journalism that matters,” said Emberson, although it was noted that while there is a growing number of women in the newsrooms, there remains gender imbalances in the coverage: “It is great to have women and men working together, getting allocated assignments on an equal basis, but we also have to see why men are being reported more,” said Emberson
“You can have the numbers in the newsroom, but as you start analyzing the portrayal, the issues, is there an equal representation of women and men? Just because you are a female reporter doesn’t necessarily mean you will provide that balanced perspective, that’s an ongoing challenge for women in newsrooms, and an issue that the SPC Pacific Women’s Bureau is also addressing,” added Bhagwan Rolls
In Fiji, Emberson also noted, women dominate the news in the areas of crime and violence on 16 February 2005. Fiji Media Watch also highlighted in their presentation that a FIJI TIMES REPORT “Female Force Mooted” by Vani Catanasiga of 16 February 2005, has been commended in the GMMP 2005 report as a case study which attempts to provide a balanced portrayal of the issue: “The headline , invites the attention of the reader without sensationalizing the subject matter and the content stresses the positive recommendations of the report, rather than dwelling on any gratuitous details of sexual assault cases,” says the GMMP report, adding that it even challenges the stereotype of a legal system that is gender neutral.
The Fiji report is being made available (email: fmwatch@connect.com.fj)
Download the complete article about the Global Report Launch:
