Diary of an Ingrate [Chapter 5]

Fri Feb 21, 2013

Eustace did not give a…

by: Frank E da Silva

[This is a republication which fits neatly into the series of Arnhim Eustace’s total indifference to people. It seems to come naturally.] I feel compelled to respond to questions raised in your editorial, “Not so Nice”, November 2. In that editorial you wrote, “However, a major question hanging over our heads whenever this issue is discussed, is just what is the involvement of the official New Democratic Party in solving the problem. As we understand, the legal case or cases arose from an NDP sponsored program [they own the program] New Times, on Nice Radio, So did the NDP take responsibility from day one when the legal issue arose? If not, have they since taken on that responsibility or are they not in a position to so do?”{{more}}

Necessary and loaded questions to which I think you know the answers. The questions are necessary because folks out there need to be focused on the real reason for the situation in which, not just Nice Radio finds itself, but the forgotten spokesman EG as well. The program was not a Nice Radio owned program and EG was acting in the capacity as one of your journalists. If one of your journalists was to write a story which got you into legal soup would you leave your employee to find his own lawyer? Since Nice Radio was not the owner of the program, the legal burden should never have been theirs. I so argued from day one, but for reasons best known to Nice, they seemed to assume responsibility. But this kind of “you are on your own” behaviour is usual to the leadership [Arnhim Eustace] of the NDP.

Readers will recall how Daniel Cummings was left hanging, abandoned as the Speaker belittled him in a trumped-up charge that he had misrepresented comments made by the Prime Minister on the matter of integrity legislation. Even though the Speaker did not know, the Prime Minister as a lawyer knows fully that “it is not what the author thinks he is saying but what a reasonable man understands him to be saying”. Mr Cummings was unfairly named for stating his perception and when I replayed the exchange many persons, stunned by the absolute silence from the Opposition bench, asked whether Cummings was alone the House. I can tell you now that one NDP high-up was delighted.

Next came the time when EG was charged with “making statements likely to cause alarm”. The day before the case was to be heard I sat all day waiting for a call for persons to go to the courthouse to give him moral support. It never came! On my program that night, I urged listeners to show their support by coming down to Kingstown wearing anything but yellow and begged silence. No sooner had I done so, I received a note from Dougie, owner of Nice Radio, telling me that the party did not want me to do that and he called to change the subject. I sent him back a note. I persisted. Linton was called to intervene but I had already briefed him about what I was going to do – I persisted. This was unbelievable – EG was on his own. For days no official put in an appearance.

After the hearing, it was reported that the NDP sent persons down there to harass and intimidate the magistrate. Ralph Gonsalves made threats and the NDP ran for cover. I took responsibility – ask Kenneth John who does not think much of me – I do not have a degree.

I could go on but back to the present predicament. Days after the original decision in the case, EG got hold of a Privy Council decision which clearly would have an impact if his case was appealed. The Jamaica Gleaner editorialized. With Mr Eustace on the program, EG was determined to read it before Eustace left that day, so with five minutes to go he did.

EDITORIAL – An important Privy Council rulingpublished: Sunday | October 15, 2006

Anyone who believes in the role of the press as a conduit for rigorous discourse and as watchdog against arbitrary behaviour by public officials will welcome last week’s ruling by Britain’s highest court, the House of Lords, that brings new interpretation to the defamation laws in the United Kingdom.

Essentially, the law lords, in a case by a Saudi businessman against the European edition of the Wall Street Journal, held that journalists, when they report responsibly on public officials on matters of public interest, are not guilty of defamation if they cannot, in court, prove the specific fact of the allegations.

This decision is of importance to Jamaica, given that it will be highly persuasive on the local courts, which, as we have argued in these columns, have, up to now, been far too restrictive in their application of the defamation laws. Judges, in our view, in their libel rulings, show undue favour to individuals, even those who hold public office, on the misguided assumption of the need to curb the assumed power and influence of the press and the protection of people’s privacy and reputation.

The often, and perhaps unintended, result of such rulings is the chilling effect it has on aggressive, but serious and responsible reporting, that places public officials under critical scrutiny and holds them responsible for their actions. The truth becomes not the fact, but only what is absolutely provable in a court of law.

In this U.K. case, Muhammed Abdual Latif Jameel argued that he was libelled because of the Wall Street Journal’s report that the United States asked the Saudi Government to place his company under surveillance because, perhaps unwittingly, it might be diverting money to a terrorist organisation.

Mr. Jameel won in the lower courts, where the judges threw out the journal’s public interest defence when the newspaper could not bring specific corroboration to support its report.

The good thing is that the Wall Street Journal could afford millions of dollars to fight the case and to win the eventual ruling that brings British defamation law, and in some respects, Jamaica’s, closer to what has existed in the United States since Sullivan vs the New York Times, 1964.

The important thing is that public officials can no longer hide reflexively behind the fact that journalists will not be able to prove the truth of the allegation no matter how factual or in the public interest it may be.

As Lord Hale pointed out in his judgement, what is required of the press is serious journalism “and defamation law should encourage rather than discourage it.” The important test, as laid out by Lord Hoffman, who wrote the primary judgement, is whether the press “behaved fairly and responsibly in gathering and publishing the information.”

Mr Eustace listened but did not get EG’s message. I played the excerpt [which is attached] while doing the countdown for days left to appeal. No takers. NICE is where it is because Eustace did not give a…. EG was left hanging just as he is now [more on that in a subsequent chapter]. Maybe if it was Ms Frederick.