ONLY last Friday President Jagdeo pointed out that Kaieteur News is engaged in a willful campaign of distortion, aimed at ruining the image of Guyana.

The president was aggressed upon by KN publisher Glenn Lall, in what the Guyana Chronicle described as an ‘emotional outburst’.

Kaieteur News responded by writing stories of press freedom, and more broadly by painting itself as an innocent victim. But how innocent is Kaieteur News? I will answer this question based on KN’s ‘own journalistic’ practices. Here we go.

I want readers to take a careful look at the Friday (September 4, 2009) edition of Kaieteur News.

There is a big caption reading “Stanleytown Pump supplier implicated in international fraud – pg. 12”. Let us examine this story carefully and see what comes out. For clarity of presentation I’ll break down each point in an easy to read format.

1. Kaieteur News originally published a front page story with huge photographs of the Stanleytown Pump alleging that the actual cost was $11 million, but that the contractor charged $61.5 million (KN July 20).

2. Kaieteur News followed this up under various stories of government corruption. All the stories were given the front page, accompanied by dramatic photographs.

3. The corruption ‘line’ has been vigorously followed by other stories of alleged corruption, all with huge photographs. In one dramatic instance KN showed a photo of a bridge, alleging corruption. This story was refuted by the contractor who pointed out that the bridge in the photograph had been built years before. The story, in other words, was a big lie.

4. Kaieteur News then began another ‘line’ of stories in which it tried to lay the blame on Minister of Agriculture, Robert Persaud.

5. The contractor who installed the Stanleytown Pump repeatedly pointed out that the KN story was erroneous. A detailed accounting was provided by Mr. Tulsi in Stabroek News letter section on September 3, 2009.

6. By September 3, 2009, the Kaieteur News strategy of using photographs to front stories of alleged corruption had caught the public’s eye, and in fact had become a captured audience.

7. Using this captured audience, and knowing fully well that Tulsi had provided a detailed accounting of the Stanleytown Pump expenditure, Kaieteur News decided to ‘move in for the kill’. What should KN do in light of Mr. Tulsi’s refutation of the macabre front page propaganda onslaught.

8. Instead of retracting the original Stanleytown Pump story, KN decided to engage in an extraordinary stunt of deceit.

9. On September 4, 2009 Kaieteur News runs the big caption noted above with the throw to Pg. 12. The story is a big hoax in that it is fundamentally misleading.

10. The hoax has two parts. The first part is that the report on international fraud has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with Guyana. The entire story is about fraud in the United States and Nigeria!

11. The second part is even more deceitful. The international fraud story was published SEVEN YEARS AGO in the United States. Kaieteur News simply reprinted that old story and inserted the words Stanleytown Pump in the story line. Please note that Kaieteur News ITSELF admits to this. No one is making this up.

12. Kaieteur News then complains that it is not able to get through to the supplier of the pump to verify the information provided by Mr. Tulsi. Believe it or not, there is more to this.

13. Mr. Tulsi’s account of the expenditures is situated next to the SEVEN-YEAR-Old report on Nigeria. The intended effect is to displace Mr. Tulsi’s account so that it would not be taken for what it is – a detailed accounting of the expenditure.

I would like readers to note the following things.

(a) Kaieteur News relies on dramatic pictures knowing fully and well that ‘a picture’ can tell a thousand words.’ The deceitful part of this is that most of these pictures are not followed up by proper investigative journalism.

(b) Kaieteur News knows fully and well that a large section of the Guyanese population do not actually read newspaper reports with care. With that knowledge, Kaieteur News then relies on photos to willfully communicate misleading information.

(c) Kaieteur News has a writing staff that has openly declared that it is interested in bringing down the current Government of Guyana.

(d) The photos used by Kaieteur News are intended to drive uncertainty, anxiety, and outright fear in the minds of the Guyanese population.

(e) The entire propaganda campaign by Kaieteur News is intended to support opposition political parties and other opposition forces that engage in ‘irregular forms of politics’.

(f) Some writers at Kaieteur News have demonstrated a pathological hatred for President Jagdeo, despite all his accomplishments.

(g) Most important of all – Kaieteur News is one of the political arms of the opposition, but when it is challenged, it screams that it is an independent newspaper.

The people of Guyana should know where President Jagdeo stands on the question of press freedom. President Jagdeo has stated that he will do everything to protect the right of the press to publish without fear. Mr. Jagdeo went so far as to say that he will protect the rights of a press even if some outlets lie. Let us see if Kaieteur News has the courage to publish this article.

Clousseau
Clousseau has spent some time reflecting on the Stabroek News’ cartoon which appeared in the issue of Thursday, September 3, 2009, basically depicting an illusion of sweeping bad news under the carpet and at the same time inviting investors and tourists to come to Guyana.

What good purpose or for that matter, what purpose at all was intended, save and except to demonstrate the ill-advised negativism that that Stabroek News holds for the administration of our country? Is it not true that in every other country, there will be good and bad issues that abound that cause dissent, that generate animosity and that are generally just plain bad? And by the same token, there will be issues of pure joy that engender upliftment, that create enthusiasm and that are generally plain good. So Clousseau asks what good really is the aim of publicising only the bad in the society. There cannot only be negative issues, indeed, an unbiased analysis of the entire situation should be pursued to arrive at a conclusion with proper equity.

Adopting a negative posture on Guyana is clearly disloyal and should be roundly condemned. Certainly the positives outweigh the negatives. Damaging our country should be a criminal act and the unbiased analysis will expose the sinister nature of the Stabroek News in their daily reporting on the events within our nation. It is shamefully palpable. In any event, linking the invitation directed to potential investors and tourists with the puerile notion of sweeping the ills of the country under the carpet is certainly in bad taste and definitely damaging to the best interests of the nation. That particular press media cannot be so naïve not to recognise and so Clousseau concludes that the sole exercise was a deliberate effort to downgrade the country. Quite unpatriotic isn’t it?

The Stabroek News would be better advised to follow one of the cardinal rules of the profession and that is to offer their comment. They can also tell the world the truth, nothing but the truth about living in a real democracy such as what obtains in present day Guyana.

Indulging in smear journalism can only reap dangerous reprisals.