J'accuse : They love me all

“To men fighting for their lives day by day in the foulest of physical conditions it was nauseating to read, day after day, the lying official communiqués in the Press.” I came across this quote in a book by BBC journalist John Simpson (Unreliable Sources, Macmillan 2010) that is turning out to be an excellent and informative run-through of “how the 20th century was reported”. The quote itself is from an unnamed book by A.J. Cummings, editor of the News Chronicle early last century.

John Simpson’s work provides an authoritative insight into how the relationship between the press and the world altered − starting from the Boer War at the close of the 19th century and ending with the Iraq war at the turn of this century. It shows how the press managed to morph into various forms: from a useful tool of government propaganda at the height of jingoistic enthusiasm, to the inventive “journalism” based on ‘stands to reason’ assumptions. The quest to ‘report’ (and be the first to do so) eventually got entangled with political motivation and eventually political slant.

Conflicts

As I type, BBC World News is showing an e-mail from a viewer questioning the wisdom of a news item (by John Simpson incidentally) from Libya that might have been useful in reporting the strife in a particular corner of the world but might also, the viewer argued, have put the lives of those reported in further peril. Journalists working in war conditions are often faced with dilemmas − they need to substantiate the claims of aggression, murder and violence but to do so they need hard evidence. The battle lines are also drawn in the field of information.

Colonel Gaddafi and his son Saif have proved to be adept at manipulating the one great weakness of public information: doubt. The Gaddafis may be psychotic, they may be a rambling caste of lunatics but they are demonstrating a knack for playing with the weak-kneed and abusing the loopholes opened up by questionable precedents in the past. Early in the struggle, Muammar displayed this knack by bringing into play the Tiananmen and Moscow exception. It was not just down to

braggadocio: Moscow and Beijing sit on the Security Council. Gaddafi was speaking directly to the capitals, reminding them of the precedent they had set.

This week, as the battle between rebels and faithful forces (it is not such a coincidence that this kind of plight sounds like a more mundane plot to Star Wars) seemed to be moving towards a desert-induced stalemate, Gaddafi and Saif went into a PR overdrive. Don’t laugh. I’m not referring to pills in Nescafe bull. I’m referring to the enormous effort to sell the idea that this was a legitimate sovereign government under threat from foreign forces. Precedent, precedent, precedent. The international community hesitated to echo the word in the street: “Gaddafi Out!” We ended up with sanctions and more evacuations.

Perception

In 1935, following the Italian invasion of Abyssinia, the League of Nations had also displayed an uncanny ability to hesitate − its inability to take effective action has been linked to the inability of the members to give the necessary importance to Abyssinia and their fear of driving Mussolini into Hitler’s hands. The script in Libya is not identical to the Abyssinian question, but the move by Gaddafi to appoint new envoys at the UN and to continue to plug the line that his is a government under siege that is being falsely depicted in the news is intended to destabilise concerted international action.

Gaddafi’s targets are the weak-willed members of the international community. They are those who hate to be reminded of cosying up to the dictator, or worse, those who hate to look at him and see a bad copy of themselves. They are those who fell for his trap of “precedent”. Russian TV has promoted newsclips denying any air raids on civilians. The corroboration of Gaddafi’s assertions seemed misplaced in the light of other news items from the rest of the world. While conspiracy theorists might revel in this 2011 equivalent of the moon landing denials, you do get to wonder how much of this corroboration was scripted with Chechnya on the Russians’ mind (or the early rumblings of the Jasmine revolution’s spread to China).

Neighbours

Closer to home we had our own set of weak-willed who seemed to be prima facie advocates of caution. Their enthusiasm to play into the hands of Gaddafi and his spin soon unmasked them though. From (EU Commissioner) John Dalli to (former politician) Reno Calleja, they inexplicably pandered to the “wait and see” approach − sometimes even venturing on the “denial of violence by Gaddafi” line. Dalli stopped just short of accusing the international press of a montage that was intended to denigrate the Green Book Writer. It will be hard for Dalli to wriggle out of this mess. What counted for Joseph Muscat, with regard to image damage when it comes to management in times of crises, will also count for Dalli if what seems to be his inevitable leadership challenge ever comes true.

Malta’s press and people have enjoyed the limelight of this Libyan Crisis in a weird way. I had a bit of a problem with this sudden heroic status of our government and state because of its aiding and the “evacuation” of people caught in the midst of the Libyan Civil Uprising. Mind you, I had no problem with what was termed ‘heroics’, the government was after all doing the decent thing.

We cheered boatloads of Koreans, Chinese and Croatian workers entering the harbour. They were fleeing a war zone but it was OK − not just OK but heroic − for us to assist them in their plight. Only a few weeks back we would have had only one type of response to boatloads of refugees/immigrants fleeing their troubles. I guess our reply then would scarcely have qualified us to lick the boots of heroes.

Love
Communication has become vital in today’s world. A simple twist of words and a dedicated barrage of counter-information can make a dictator sound like the victim of a foreign conspiracy. There will always be those who are either too stupid, too duped or too involved to ask the right questions. Today’s press holds an important weapon in the battle for truth and justice. When wielded by the wrongpeople it can cause anything from irreparable damage to mental stagnation.

I wonder, though, what it will take to convince someone like John Dalli that the half a Libyan body (torso up) lying in the streets of Benghazi does not love Gaddafi. What media orchestration could have hospitals unable to take new patients, blood running on the streets and hundreds of thousands of people fleeing the country? Are all these people so stupid to have swallowed the media montages to the hilt? Really John: can you believe Muammar Gaddafi when he smiles at the BBC correspondent and says: “The people… they love me all”?

Jacques René Zammit blogs daily at www.akkuza.com… celebrating six years of pioneering quality blogging in Malta
on 10 March.

This article and accompanying Bertoon appeared yesterday in the Malta Independent on Sunday.