The battle for a Thai free press

Kavi Chongkittavorn, The Nation, Asia News Network/Bangkok

The public and civil society organizations, including media professionals, must not rest on their laurels after their triumphant bout with GMM Grammy forced it to fold on its hostile bid to take over Matichon, a respected Thai-vernacular daily.

What we have witnessed in the past five days was just a tip of the iceberg. As long as the overall political atmosphere -- dominated by one ruling party under Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and his circle of business bigwigs -- remains, the country's free press and freedom of expression will never be guaranteed.

In hindsight, the public outrage could be properly understood from a broader perspective against the backdrop of growing "public mistrust" of those who are running the country. Since Thaksin assumed his premiership in early 2001, he has turned Thailand into a jailed bird. The public voice has been gagged as the media's ability to do their job professionally and independently has shrunk.

Almost miraculously, entertainment baron Paiboon Damrongchaitham appears with a wand wearing a long, pointed head. When he commented at the first press conference on Tuesday that his out-of-the-blue stock acquisition of Matichon was done in good faith to expand his business empire and was not politically motivated, the public was perplexed. His pledge not to interfere with Matichon's editorial policy and content as the paper's biggest shareholder immediately became the butt of a joke. Nobody believed him.

It was exactly these comments and circumstantial evidence of close ties between him and Thaksin that quickly snowballed into a larger public outcry. Instantaneously, chat rooms, internet bulletin boards and SMS messages were buzzing with disbelief and condemnation. From that moment on, it was clear that Paiboon had unwittingly underestimated the massive backlash from his maverick takeover.

Although there were no large physical turnouts or demonstrations to gauge the public resentment, somehow a strong public sentiment against Grammy's bid could be weighted through word-of-mouth among Matichon's readers and supporters. For instance, in Thaisolidarity.org, people registering their names to condemn the bid increased from 100 to over 600 in just 20 hours. If the company did not budge, a full-scale boycott campaign against Grammy artistes and products was in the offings.

Within hours, media-related advocacy and consumer groups, intelligentsia and journalists suddenly found a common cause to defend against what they perceived as a blatant, unjust and politically motivated assault on press freedom. The public defense of the 27-year-old Matichon, which has epitomized intellectual vitality and democratic values, showed that, for the Thai free press to survive, journalists need the support of the larger society. Indeed, press freedom is inseparable from societal well-being and knowledge.

So when Thaksin declared recently that Thailand has one of the freest media in the region because the press has criticized him with relish, he was in error. He was confusing his personal grudge with the concept of press freedom, whereby freedom refers to the overall atmosphere conducive to free press and access to information. Therefore, it is imperative that all stakeholders must ensure this impromptu solidarity lives on and never dies. After all, in the past five years, the Thai print media has been butchered into pieces through clever tactics by the ruling party.

The public, under the spell of populist policies, has not responded to past abuses of the media. Meanwhile, fearing economic retaliation, quite a few media establishments, especially those in electronic media, have succumbed to the pressure. Now, it is time to rise up, fight back and break free.

In the aftermath of the 1997 economic crisis, vested interest groups, comprising mainly politicians and tycoons, have slowly gained control of the print media due to its weak financial foundations. Using the tyranny of market mechanisms and defamation law, they have been quite effective in destroying the inner strength of media establishments ability to operate freely. Such insidious tactics have been deployed with increasing frequency under the second Thaksin government.

The Bangkok Post was the latest casualty. No less significant was the cancellation of Muang Thai Rai Sapda, hosted by Sondhi Limthongkul, on Thursday by the Mass Communication Organization of Thailand (MCOT). It was a clear violation of constitutional rights enjoyed by all Thai citizens, and nothing more. MCOT's justication was buffoonery.

Judging from Thaksin's longstanding anti-press public statements, the government will continue to undermine the free press and seek further media's control. Thaksin and his Cabinet, not to mention his coterie of business associates, believe strongly that even the current tamer and friendlier Thai press are still too critical and unsuitable for populist politics. From now on, Thailand is entering the era of "mega-projects" spending sprees.

In the past three months, the scandalous new airport's scanner purchase reported by the press has already bruised public trust and confidence in the government. If the press has its way now and its investigative capacity is not clipped, more exposure of corruption and intrigue will certainly surface.

In the end, Matichon's victory was extremely expensive, but it is worth defending with every baht and satang, even though stock manipulators pocketed tons of money. It also serves as a new benchmark for those who want to co-opt the media: The public is on our side, at least for the time being, and readily mobilized.