Dirty Politics
pp. 7-8 · Read in the full issue
Dear Madam After reading your article entitled “Leadership Struggle In Tuvalu” by Michael Field in the February issue of PIM, I cannot help but to interrogate the
quality and the competence of the journal ist. Being an islander and with great respect for your magazine reputed as con taining articles with quality and facts, one has to ask with second thoughts whether the media is there to inform us or to fool us. To start with, I would like to address myself to the author, Mr Field, for his neg ativity on this country is very evident. I would certainly think that being a journal
ist requires neutrality especially on politi
cal issues.
What I gathered from your logic is that you seem to imply or reduce the existence of a nation or a person to materialism.
What struck me even more is that your name doesn’t hint on any Pacific origin, yet your article seems to reflect our popu lar way of thinking where one likes to rejoice in the downfall of another. On a theoretical level, the way you approached the subject has failed to convince the read ers that you stand firm on facts, even though you constantly cite your sources.
In addition, you seem to comment on Tuvalu in comparison with developed states. In this case your comparative method is out of date. I believe that one
has to dig through our social and cultural history in order to understand the political and economical universe of the Pacific.
I wonder what kind of readers you are trying to satisfy. Are you trying to satisfy the so-called “way of thinking of our soci ety” or to explain the political universe ?
One may even lead to think that the motive of your writing lies in commercial reasons.
The absence of neutrality in your writing is accentuated by a lot of judgements on val ues - so by the end of it, I cannot find the main purpose of your comments, neither did I learn anything new.
Your article appears in under the Politics banner, so I will try to present a rebuttal on a political and economical level. Browsing through your article once again, one will be surprised to find that the only political term used doesn’t appear until the end of the article: the “artificial state”, implying that a state can only exist through infrastructure, yet you fail to define the deeper meaning of a “Nation- State”. I believe that the feeling of national unity is not necessarily based on material
success, but more on the people’s con sciousness. From the little I know and if you were familiar with the political envi ronment in the Pacific, you would have noticed that the elements that you enumer ated on Tuvalu are common to the political arena of the Pacific or the developing world.
Another surprising factor is the way you bring in religion as an argument to your political debate. From your sarcasm, one would think that you take yourself as God in a position to judge who should be a Godly nation and who shouldn’t be. Since we are still on political levels, you high lighted on the “dirty politics” in Tuvalu, I cannot help but to refer to your article as a
“dirty political” one.
You may oppose me by your revendi cation on the freedom of the media. I am very conscious of the fact that you are the fourth power in society, but the game of “checks and balances” gives me the right to question the quality of your information.
I am an active reader, not a sponge, and enjoy reflecting on issues published by the
media. You may even try to convince me with the fact that you have access to politi cians, but it is more on the way you anal yse the situation and transmit it to me that counts. To voice out these type of news, there are no doubt special magazines for that. . You, the media as an entity of power, should reflect on your limits. There is a basic principle that you seem to forget : Anything is permitted until it troubles the neighbour’s sphere. I do believe that you, as an entity, are within the boundaries of this principle. Your role is to educate and inform the public, and help us to enrich our knowledge on issues. So to conclude, I am readdressing myself to the author : Your implications that Tuvalu is filled with “dirty politics” are contradictory to the logic of your comments. Your article clear ly and surely shows that you have indirect ly contributed to this phenomena of “dirty
politics”.
Concerned Readers