TRC Final Report

Volume 1

Chapter 11

Part OtherDepts

Subsection 18

■ MEDIA LIAISON

6 Media liaison was made a high priority from the first meeting of the Commission on 16 December 1995. The volume of news which the Commission’s activities promised made this essential. It was also clear that if the Commission could meet the demands of the media for newsworthy material, this would help it fulfil its mandate to report to the nation on human rights violations and allow it to do so on a continuous basis throughout the life of the Commission.

7 The public image of the Independent Electoral Commission in 1994 gave warnings of the pitfalls that would lie ahead. The Commission had an enormous task; it could not begin to deliver on all expectations, and there was considerable potential for journalists to focus on areas that the Commission would not be able to cover. The Commission began operating on the premise that the fundamental task of the media liaison officers was to ensure that the Commission’s public image reflected the reality of what the Commission was and did. The objective was, thus, not to manipulate the Commission’s image, but to project accurately the challenges, the successes and the difficulties.

8 In implementing media liaison policy, the Commission attempted to adhere to the following principles.

Transparency

9 While the chairperson, the vice-chairperson and the chief executive officer were appointed the Commission’s only spokespersons on matters of policy and implementation, the media had direct access to all commissioners and portfolio heads on matters that lay within their individual jurisdiction. The media liaison office was not used as a means of filtering inquiries or providing a ‘public relations front’ for the Commission. The Commission held that, if journalists were to inform the public accurately, they needed to speak directly to those who made and implemented decisions in the organisation. Thus, the media liaison office’s task was to provide strategic and technical advice to the Commission on how best to convey news and to provide support for and be constantly available to journalists when Commissioners were unable to respond to media inquiries.

Proactive Release of Information

10 The Media Liaison Office promoted the pre-emptive release of news, whether it reflected well or badly on the Commission. The office also sought to encourage the simultaneous release of information to all the media in an attempt to achieve circumstances conducive to an early, single, full and thorough explanation of what the Commission was doing. The following extracts from reports of the Media Liaison Office during September and October 1996 illustrate the approach which the Commission attempted to follow:

The need for speed and flexibility needs to be stressed: when the Commission hesitates for too long before releasing news, it often trickles out bit by bit to individual journalists. This reduces the interest of other journalists, who do not like to carry late, second-hand news. It also forces us into a reactive position, where those with interests other than those of the Commission make the running in how the news is presented.

It goes without saying that anonymous leaks of important information by individuals acting without a mandate destroy our capacity to present the information in a co-ordinated, proactive way. They need to be avoided if we are to avoid constantly being caught on the back foot. At the same time it needs to be said that the longer we delay in releasing important information, the more we are held hostage by the agendas of those responsible for leaks.

It is strongly recommended that the Commission should run its media liaison operation in a manner which draws the public into its decision making. Thus, the Commission should constantly give consideration to releasing draft documents indicating proposals under discussion before they are finalised. This does involve risks, such as public perceptions being influenced by ideas which are not eventually adopted. But the exposure of proposals to public debate before decisions are taken enhances the credibility of the final decisions.

11 The following extracts, also from the media liaison reports, concerning problems the Commission was facing in 1996 also illustrate the approach of the Department:

We discuss our intentions instead of announcing our actions, or at least too far ahead of implementing our intentions, leading to days and weeks of questions from the media about when we are going to act, and to allegations that we talk and don’t act. And when unexpected developments delay the gap between the declaration of an intention and implementation, we lose credibility.

Through our failure to think through the release of news thoroughly enough, we do not give journalists comprehensive enough briefings, and misunderstandings and distortions arise. Journalists who do not regularly cover the Commission misunderstand developments, especially when they do not have written statements.

12 The sensitivity - even explosiveness - of information at the disposal of the Commission led to constant consideration as to when information should be released. This involved balancing a number of factors:

a the right of victims of gross violations of human rights to early access to information; b the right of those implicated to their detriment to information in advance of its publication by the Commission; c the right of the public to information about violations; d the potential of the publication of information to prejudice ongoing Commission investigations into the violations.

13 At various times in the life of the Commission, it was criticised from all sides over the timing of the release of information. the Commission should constantly give consideration to releasing draft documents indicating proposals under discussion before they are finalised. This does involve risks, such as public perceptions being influenced by ideas which are not eventually adopted. But the exposure of proposals to public debate before decisions are taken enhances the credibility of the final decisions.