[governance] Rwanda and media

Thu Oct 4 08:36:03 EDT 2007

Dr Müller's remark misses the point regarding Chavez on two counts: the 
first is rightly pointed out by David -- the elites (with the near 
exclusive privilege of disseminating their views through the big media) 
do not like that others keep telling them they are in power for 
centuries and have been making sure that there continues to be just a 
few well-off and a smashing majority of very poor in Latin America. If 
there is a success story of the elites in LA, this is it.

The second is that Chavez did not take away the licence. It expired and 
the government has the prerrogative to renew it or not. Terms of the 
contract say explicitly the incumbent network will not engage in 
demoralizing a constitutionally elected government (this and similar 
restrictions were not created by Chavez, they are part of nearly all 
radio and TV concessions in democratic countries). The renewal referred 
to the open air TV licence only, but the same conservative media group 
continues to operate through cable TV (which is fine for them, the ones 
who have cable TV in Venezuela are the ones who generally support the 
opposition, the upper classes who are mostly opposed to Chavez, so they 
are happily talking to each other). If Chavez were really bound to do 
what the Murdoch gang keeps telling us, he would just block the group's 
access to cable TV as well.

We are here right now in a similar process in Brazil, but the outcome 
will quite probably be different. The Globo/Slim media group has several 
radio and TV channel licences expiring or expired (as do most of the 
other big private networks), and civil society organizations are 
mobilized to open up discussion regarding renewal of hundreds of these 
public concessions. Frequency spectrum is an asset of the commons and 
the State is its guardian on behalf of the people, so there is a need to 
discuss whether the current incumbents deserve renewal -- strictly 
speaking, most do not, as they have violated on many counts the terms of 
their concession contracts for proper use of an asset of the commons. A 
lot similar with the private appropriation for profit of the Internet 
critical resources we will be discussing in Rio.

Another point is that Chavez did not do a coup d'état, American style 
(meaning Somozas, Pinochets and the sort) -- to the contrary, the USA 
stimulated a coup d'état against him which failed miserably in a few 
days. He did all he did (with imperfections, mistakes and whatever, 
please point us to a regime anywhere in the developing world which is 
perfect...) within the legal political system of the country. Sorry for 
the elitist opposition if he won, but he won through elections and 
plebiscites. The rest is the anti-Chavez political campaigning through 
Murdoch's networks and their kin. BTW, a similar process is now going on 
in Ecuador, with the economist Correa at the head, legally elected in a 
constitutional democracy. I wonder what the big international media 
corporations will be telling us all about him? Very soon there will be 
no Correa's government, but "Correa's regime" etc etc...

[]s fraternos

--c.a.

David Goldstein wrote:
> Milton said "Look at how Hugo Chavez is using media licensing rules
> in Venezuela ."
> 
> I find this a bit rich. The media in Venezuela has oppressed the poor
> for decades, and when someone stands up to the media, who represent
> the upper classes, they are branded as being censorious. Obviously it
> would be better if Chavez did not take away the licence for the TV
> station it would be better. But then, Venezuela has been a tool of
> the rich to exploit the poor for a long time.
> 
> I agree with the rest of his points though.
> 
> David
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message ---- From: Milton L Mueller <mueller at syr.edu> 
> To: governance at lists.cpsr.org; KovenRonald at aol.com Cc:
> Embench at aol.com Sent: Thursday, 4 October, 2007 5:35:04 AM Subject:
> [governance] Rwanda and media
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> I agree with Rony. And I would ask advocates of media restrictions
> whether they believe that the existence of government rules
> regulating the media in Rwanda would have prevented the genocide. Who
> would have promulgated, monitored and enforced those rules in Rwanda
> ? Which ethnic faction? Which independent judges? When the state is
> nothing but an armed gang, and all disputes are settled by force, the
> idea that the media can be regulated to enforce civility is
> self-evidently nonsensical. In those cases, media regulations simply
> become another tool for the dominant party to oppress the others.
> Look at how Hugo Chavez is using media licensing rules in Venezuela .
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> From: KovenRonald at aol.com [mailto:KovenRonald at aol.com]
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> RMC was in fact a weapon in a civil war, and it would have been 
> justified to bomb it out of existence if it could have been found.
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-- 

Carlos A. Afonso
Rio       Brasil
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