The Third World Media Network (TWMN) in a statement issued on the eve of the World Press Freedom Day on May 3, 2024 called upon the media practitioners to join others to protect the planet, climate and environment to secure our future. TWMN President Sohel Manzur and Secretary General Geoffrey Kapembwa issued the statement on Thursday. Details of the statement are as follows:
As we join millions of media practitioners and world leaders across the globe in commemorating this year’s World Press Freedom Day, we equivocally and without ‘Fear or Favour’ take a stance to join media colleagues covering and monitoring shortcomings relating to the planet, climate and the environment as part of the rudiments of journalism we espouse.
Premised on this year’s theme: “A Press for the Planet: Journalism in the Face of the Environmental Crisis”, our deep thoughts and sympathy go to our brothers and sisters in the profession who provide checks despite the dangers abound.
The media, as the Fourth Estate, tasked to Inform, Educate and Entertain its paymasters-the public and Governments in which they exist, have had to endure in covering stories in various terrains relating to the planet.
Archaic and inimical laws enacted by some selfish Governments and contrasting journalism practices are being championed by the same ill-motivated leaders, advancing ill-motives for their selfish gains and at the expense of the citizenry they serve.
Sadly, the world over is seemingly entangled in various impeding media infringements as the media strive to cover planet, climate and environment related tasks and unearth the causes and bring out the remedies.
This is because the culprits that maximize profits for their selfish gains have put in barriers through various restrictions including laws that are inimical to environmental reporting.
The case of the world’s major polluters, China, US, India, European Union, Russia, Japan and Brazil, few among the 10 main global polluters with environmental abuses in excess of 1.14 million tons of CO2, is a case study.
The culprits have deliberately and without regret, continued to pollute the environment through coal production and GreenHouse Gases and when asked to compensate affected nations, chiefly the developing and Least Development Countries, who take the ‘punch’ of their impunity, they shy away with no shame.
Since the commencement of the Conference Of Parties (COP) 1 held in Berlin, Germany in 1995 where States assessed the progress made towards the goals set in the Paris Agreement and charted a course of action until 2023 when COP 28 was held last year and hosted by the United Arab Emirates in Dubai, the main polluters have failed to even fulfill the US$100 billion pledged for affected countries to reinvest in their degraded environment as induced by them.
Some of the outcomes published by the International Press Institute (IPI), a media watchdog, range from serious threats, attacks, arrest and detention; legal harassment; online harassment and hate campaigns; restrictions on freedom of movement; and challenges accessing information.
According to testimonies adduced from about 21 countries-randomly-by over 40 environmental and climate journalists, ‘it’s not easy to cover this assignment because of the various intricacies including variety of risks, corruption, inept laws among other challenges frustrating the scribes in their work’.
Censorship which silences vital public-interest information and endangers the fight to protect the environment and address the climate crisis is abound. Powerful players, with excess financial resources and are linked to pollutive and environmentally harmful activities emerge as they have strong political connections to take centre state.
Sadly, IPI notes: “many environmental journalists are freelancers, thus not having the layers of protection offered by large news organizations. ¢ Journalists covering environmental disasters and the climate crisis are often first responders and face risks for which they may not be trained or equipped. ¢
Polarization around climate and environmental issues generates enormous hostility against journalists, who are often accused of taking sides.”
Such, IPI notes, are some of the dangers that continue haunting the brothers and sisters who, in their professional consciousness, offer to cover Planet, climate and environmental related stories for the same of our paymasters-the people, despite the various “Hazards on the Road”.
On this day, we stand and salute all our fellow practitioners who have ventured in the developmental news reporting for their commitment and bravely. This is to ensure Planet, climate and environmental exploitative practices-including the indiscriminate cutting of trees that encourage deforestation that have heightened climate change and is haunting the world with no immediate solution in sight are curtailed through media.
Once against, in saluting our fellow media colleagues reporting Planet, Environmental and Climate to protect “Mother Earth” for the sake of posterity amid plenty headwinds, we challenge world leaders-North-South-East and West of the globe to introspect and realize the crimes being committed through these uncouth practices.
Environmental and climate reporting, embraced under Planet Earth, carry a lot of inherent risks faced by environmental journalists in pursuing such stories of democratic and natural importance and how the rule of law, public sector corruption and economic pressure have taken a toll on them.
Like the English saying: “Every Dog has Its Own Day”, One day, soon, re-defined laws we’ll catch up with those experimenting and trying to control the climate through wanton destruction of the planet and the environment and seek environmental justice.
For the Editor:
ABOUT TWMN:
- The Bangladesh-headquartered media watchdog is a member-driven Non-Governmental Organisation. It provides oversight in all the 52-Least Developed Countries. Its main objective is to provide a platform for journalists from the developing and least developed countries to work together for the improvement of their professional standards and to try to adhere to fair professional practices.
- The TWMN aims to inculcate among members the need to maintain high ethical standards and accuracy for enhancing the credibility of a free press, which is vital for development of any nation.
- The TWMN aims to promote high quality journalism through imparting training, and providing a forum for discussion, debate, and exchanges of views and experience to the reporters, editors, media executives and other media professionals particularly in the developing countries.
- It monitors and studies the present and future challenges facing the media and support networks among media professionals within the developing nations and with other parts of the world.
