Sanaa: Intellectuals and human rights activists called on the official and partisan media for a reasonable degree of neutrality and objectivity while covering the September elections.
In a symposium on organising media in elections concluded yesterday in Sanaa by the Human Rights Information and Training Centre (HRITC), a local NGO, the participants confirmed that free and fair elections cannot be achieved without neutral, professional and objective media.
"Unfortunately, elections, in official and partisan media, is a season of exchanging accusations despite the fact that the media ... can perform a positive role for the fairness of the elections as a general principle not a temporary process," said writer Nabeel Al Sofi, who participated in the symposium with a work paper on the role of civil society and media in enhancing the fairness of elections.
"The independent media is still brittle and feeble and the parties do not get convinced of them especially at the time of elections," he added.
Al Sofi also criticised the civil society organisations, saying: "They come back to their partisan dens during the elections and they do not play an effective role in the election process as they are supposed to do". Al Sofi called on the political parties to keep away from speaking about flaws and defects of other parties to cover theirs: "The ways used to administrate election campaigns ... does not serve the competitive elections".
The participants also urged the official media to highlight the homeland public interests and not focus on a political party in particular.
Abdu Mohammad Al Jandai, Head of Media Sector in the Supreme Committee of Elections and Referendums (SCER), said that the law put the public media, regarding election propaganda, under the control of SCER, which divides the time equally between candidates for their programmes.
But, he said, the coverage of the President's official activities is not considered a part of the election propaganda.
He added that no one could control the election propaganda but the independent press could make an assessment for SCER and the candidates.
"We lie to ourselves when we say we are completely neutral because there are interventions from outside, but there is a balance due to the representation of all political trends and neutrality is achieved by applying the law," he said.
"The agreement signed between the ruling General People's Congress and an alliance of Opposition, Joint Meeting Parties, also creates a balance in the structure of SCER, so Yemen will witness the best election process," Al Janadi said.
He warned of false propaganda and exaggerating promises during the campaigns: "It will be criticised by SCER because manipulation of the people's emotions and sentiments is considered as an immoral and unacceptable action."
Abdul Bari Taher, writer, said in his paper titled 'Neutrality of Official Media': "The official media [TV, radio and newspapers, etc.] run as if they were owned by the ruling party and they look at the opposition as a taboo or a crime."
