By Dr. Edward Perera
There is no doubt that the BBC is a focal point of many controversial discussions on ethics of media. There is a general psychology that one does not oblige to smooth functioning of things all the time as it could be boring to others. It is not uncommon to the BBC to violate ethical codes in media and to provoke the listeners in order to draw the attention of the masses. This may function as sideline advertising without any cost (but in the long run, it could definitely be very costly for them).
On several occasions, BBC apologized to the wronged parties, but only when the issue had been challenged by the victims. In other words, the definition of ethics would depend on the kind of resistance from the affected parties. If the victims are strong and do resist, then follows the Apology.
Minister G.L. Peiris of GOSL in his recent visit to England had participated in a conference at Cambridge University and had several official meetings with business people and addressed interest groups. During his visit BBC Sinhala Service did a telephone interview with the minister. Consequently, BBC announced bluntly that the Minister admitted Human right violations in Sri Lanka. The fact was that BBC had twisted the Minister's statement in an attempt to discredit Sri Lanka. Later they admitted that it was a mistake but an enormous damage had already been done.
Some months ago, BBC telecast a TV documentary on AIDS in India. The focus person was a young school boy from India aged around 10 years. The story narrated how the father of this family was infected with HIV and it was sexually transmitted to his wife. As a result, this poor boy was born to the world as an HIV infected person. Though this family was living from hand to mouth, the little boy had very high aspirations to become a medical doctor one day to serve his community. During the interview with this boy, he clearly expressed his wish not get exposed to his school mates that he is infected with HIV. This is a very reasonable request, which was disregarded by BBC. No civilized person or institution would tolerate this kind of humiliation as to what the BBC under the so-called Reporters without Borders did to this innocent boy. The confidentiality that this boy maintained for nearly 10 years was blown to pieces within a few hours of exposing his name, whereabouts, the school he attends etc. etc.
There was no one to challenge BBC on this direct violation of human rights as the victim was a poor South Indian boy and there was no apology at all. Thereby, it became news within the ethical definition of the BBC.
Above events are two examples from recent BBC broadcasting. The popular slogan of "Reporters without Borders" seems to be an undercover pretext of liberalism, freedom and humanity in a broad sense. This trend is not confined only to one particular institute but has become a common feature in world media. It is being observed by many neutral individuals that the practice is not the same as what the theory preaches.
BBC as one of the leading media organisations in the world shows a greater degree of bias to some groups. It pretends that its moral commitment is to protect the rights of ethnic or religious minorities in the world. Everyone knows that there is an ethnic minority in the world called Singhalese living in Sri Lanka and their heritage is well preserved for over 2500 years. This old civilization has proved its peaceful coexistence with the other communities through many centuries in this small island. What is the mistake done by the Sinhela Buddhist community to be targeted by an Organisation like BBC? The answers for this particular question would definitely open many closed doors in the context of politics and religion.
Nearly 18 years ago, a BBC camera team was hired by the then Archbishop of Canterbury Robert Runcie to make a documentary on a Sri Lankan Student, whose visa was not extended to stay in England as he did not complete his studies within the given time. He could deceive the Church saying that the Sri Lankan authorities were waiting to interrogate him immediately on his arrival in the country as he was a supporter of the LTTE. Until this programme was broadcast, no one in Sri Lanka had ever heard about this person and no government was interested in him other than the British authorities who decided to deport him as an unwanted person.
It was a great surprise that the Archbishop of Canterbury was personally involved in this matter to get his visa extended and finally Dr. Robert Runcie persuaded the BBC camera team to fly with this "pro LTTE Sri Lankan student" up to Zurich with the hope of getting him asylum in Switzerland. As asylum was denied in Zurich, he was flown to his final destination. To the great disappointment of BBC, he was able to enter the country freely. He has full freedom like any other citizen to live or travel aboard any time. I followed this coverage live at that time and wondered whether the Church and BBC work jointly to help him as he is half Tamil Christian. They hardly raised their voices when many thousands of Sinhalese Buddhists youth in Sri Lanka were massacred in two separate incidents, one in 1971 and the other in 1988-89. It is clear that the Church and BBC worked jointly to create a story to tarnish the image of Sri Lanka.
So long as masses remain insensitive to ethical violation of media; an organisation like BBC could ridicule the world community with twisted and distorted news. Some tend to believe that all that BBC broadcast could be true due to the name and the fame of this institute. This background psychology could have adverse effect to the neutrality in evaluating information in the long run. Can the world community expect unbiased news from BBC, when it loses its credibility by disseminating false propaganda of malice by outfits like Tamil Tiger Terrorist Movement? Why is BBC bias to pro LTTE allegations against Sri Lankan people? Any such bias view could denounce the dignity of the people and deny the very existence of democratically elected government in that country. Is it not an act of mangling the virtues of that country? Sri Lanka is a member of United Nations.
The majority Sinhalese are willing to live as Sri Lankan with a common identity with all minorities.. Contrarily, some members of the minority groups feel comfortable to maintain their identity as Tamils or Muslims and this could be due to group insecurity as a social phenomenon. What the world community with the help of leading international media could do is to help such isolated groups to overcome this feeling of insecurity. Once the minority groups adopt the resist sentiments, it could make the majority also insecure and finally it will result in ethnic tension.
Being aware of this social aspect, BBC should have never advocated the ethnic line wishing flames in the fire of ethnic tension. Has BBC ever talked about the contribution of Buddhism in Sri Lanka, which shaped the positive way of thinking of the Sinhela majority in this land? Did it mention single word against unethical conversion taking place in remote rural areas in Sri Lanka? Why is then this calamity aroused by BBC to divide people in the region. Can it be a continuation of neo-colonialism? Having taken many past events in these countries into consideration, one cannot exclude the conspiratory process, which had governed and terrorized the political and social establishments in the region. BBC cannot be unaware of the depths and the gravity of the ethnic tension in these countries.
I do not want to leave facts behind but to dig them out for open minded people, who could draw their own conclusions in relation to the violation of morality in journalism. The following example cannot be an incident by mistake and no apology has been made by BBC as yet for this deep infliction.
In the year 2004 March at 3.51a.m BBC beamed a TV programme to the world to give the impression that the Buddhism in Sri Lanka is degenerated to a greater extent causing damage to civil life, making people unhappy and frustrated.
This programme had levelled allegations against Buddhist institutions saying that Sri Lanka has the highest suicide rate in Asia and the number of psychiatric patients were increasing gradually as a result of prevailing Buddhist ethics in that country. Either the BBC acted ignorantly, that the Land of Helas had achieved high level of social life nurtured by Buddhist culture over 2500 years or they have become "his master's voice" to propagate anti-Buddhist sentiments drawing totally distorted image on Buddhism. BBC argument could be fruitful only if Sri Lanka has a population of 100% Buddhists but the fact is many crimes are committed by minority groups proportionately far in excess of their numbers.
The crime reports of the Police department clearly shows that crime rate in northern Colombo and in coastal areas up to Chillaw are very high. Contrary to the BBC report, I do not relate this criminal tendency with the Catholic religion or with Tamil identity, even though the majority in these areas are dwelled by ethnic and religious minorities who are not Buddhists. This clearly indicates what the "Reporters without Borders" do enjoy with their immoral journalism. Every game has rules. It is evident that the BBC is playing a game without rules.
LTTE leader Prabhakaran had once said that, it takes only a couple of weeks for Sinhalese people to forget things. Ironically, BBC seems to be a leading follower of this sarcastic statement of the terrorist leader. BBC may live in the myth that the Sinhela People would forget all the media atrocities committed by their organisation. If it is true, they are overtly mistaken. There is a saying that one can fool someone all the time but not everyone all the time. The conduct of BBC is under observation of international journalists, who are well aware of this so called freedom of expression (Reporters without Borders) borders and these inflictive measures of BBC are condemned by decent people all over the world.
