Who killed the private media?

April 21, 2019Posted inMedia2 Comments
Who's the hangman?The World Press Freedom report is out. Bhutan’s position has improved significantly to 80 from 94 from last year. Bhutan’s overall position has also improved during my tenure in government, from 92 to 80. So I’m happy. But I’m not happy about the state of our private media. In the two years leading up to the start of parliamentary democracy, private media thrived and continued to grow for a few more years. At one time, we had 11 private newspapers! Then, gradually, private newspapers started shutting down. Bhutan Observer was the first to fold. They were followed…

State owned enterprises

April 19, 2019Posted inEconomy, Government, Media2 Comments
The Interim GovernmentLast year, during the election period, the Interim Government seems to have conducted a study of state owned enterprises and released a report that is critical of companies established by the former government. That’s okay. It’s good that the Interim Government was concerned whether “established protocol” was followed while establishing the new companies and recommended strategies to streamline the system. What’s not okay is the timing. The Interim Government seems to have taken up the issue of SOEs immediately after the primary elections ... that is after PDP lost. So I’m still wondering if SOEs would have…

Cost-cutting measures

August 25, 2013Posted inGovernment, Media36 Comments
Press Release 23 August 2013 Bearing in mind the current state of the economy faced with a growing public debt, INR dearth and ever increasing current expenditure, the Fourth sitting of the Cabinet decided on adopting austerity measures to rein in unnecessary and excessive spending. As such, the Cabinet has decided to implement the following cost cutting measures until economic situation improves in the country:  1. Pay: As per recommendation of the National Assembly conveyed vide NAB-SP/2010/74, dated 16/12/2010, the pay scales for the Ministers of the Second Parliament was to be increased from Nu.78,000 – 1,560 – 85,800…

Impostor!

February 27, 2013Posted inDemocracy, Media14 Comments
Impersonating anyone on social media is easy. All that's needed is to create an account using that person's name, photo and other relevant information. And the impersonator is in business. We've seen one person impersonate the prime minister on Twitter. And another person, also on Twitter, has been going around as MP Tshering Penjor. More recently, someone has opened a Facebook page pretending to be me. I don't mind impersonators on social media, especially if their purpose is to expose and make fun of the stupidity and excesses of public officials. This type of satire could generate much-needed laughter,…

Illegal censorship

February 19, 2013Posted inMedia19 Comments
Bhutanomics is a political satire blog set up by "Bhutan analyzers" who are committed to keeping a check on the "ballooning egos of the powerful so that they don’t forget the people are watching." The blog was launched in March, last year. And within no time, they attracted a large and faithful following which seemed to keep growing. Traffic to the blog was so high that the administrators were forced to upgrade and expand their website infrastructure several times. Then, all of a sudden, on 12 January, Bhutanomics went dead. Their website was inaccessible. In fact, users of Tashi's or Samden's ISPs…

Keeping watch

August 16, 2012Posted inMedia42 Comments
Today's issue ofThe Bhutanesehas only three announcements (one each by BOB, CBS and TCB), and one felicitation message (by Lhaki Group).

Public resources control media?

August 14, 2012Posted inGovernment, Media86 Comments
About four months ago, on 28 April, The Bhutanese complained in their editorial that the government was increasingly “using their advertisement revenue to ‘fix’ critical papers …” Last Saturday, Business Bhutan published a copy of a circular, marked “confidential”, directing all departments within the Ministry of Information and Communication “not to provide any advertisement, announcement, notification, circular, etc” to The Bhutanese. The letter, dated 2 April, was issued at the instruction of the Minister. Lyonpo Nandalal Rai, the minister of information and communications, has clarified that the circular was a result of miscommunication; that he had meant “Bhutanese media”,…

The Journalist?

June 2, 2012Posted inMedia32 Comments
Politicians and political parties love media coverage. The Journalist, a weekly paper, has featured PDP on its cover, directly or indirectly, in four of its last 8 issues. Therefore, PDP must be happy. Right? Not exactly. Every one of The Journalist’s stories on PDP during the last two months has a negative bias. And almost every one of them seems to be intended to undermine the PDP, and to discredit its president. The Journalist began their 1st April cover story by telling readers that: The talk in town is that Gasa MP, Damchoe Dorji, the only opposition member apart…

Right to information

March 28, 2012Posted inDemocracy, Media36 Comments
Article 7 of the Constitution is about our fundamental rights. Section 3 of that important article declares that "A Bhutanese citizen shall have the right to information". By this provision, any citizen has the right - a fundamental right - to ask the government for any information. And the government must provide that information, whatever it may be. That is because the fundamental right of the citizen to government information, as granted by the Constitution, is unqualified. And it is unconditional. "A Bhutanese citizen shall have the right to information" - that's all the Constitution says, simple and straightforward.…

The Bhutanese

February 21, 2012Posted inMedia78 Comments
The Bhutanese, Bhutan’s latest newspaper, was launched today, coinciding with His Majesty the King’s 32nd birth anniversary, in a quiet ceremony in their offices in Chubachu. The Bhutanese is our 11th newspaper. But it is the first to use the broadsheet format. So while we’ve become used to reading small, comfortable tabloid papers, The Bhutanese offers the feel of a bigger and more real newspaper. They’ve used the extra space well. In their very fist issue they take on the “DPT vice president involved in Nu 300 mn Thimphu land scam”, the “Commission Raj in the health ministry…”, arbitrary…

Exciting news

February 9, 2012Posted inMedia15 Comments
There’s excitement in the air. The media fraternity has finally launched the Journalists Association of Bhutan. The journey has been long: it began way back in 2006, and has included a UNDP funded project and the establishment of the Bhutan media foundation. So, naturally, our journalists are excited. I'm excited too. I congratulate our journalists. And I wish them success in their mission to improve the quality of journalism in Bhutan. Congratulations also to JAB’s office bearers, especially to their first president, Passang Dorji. But there’s another reason for that excitement. The media fraternity has been preoccupied by a…

Truly shocking!

September 22, 2011Posted inMedia9 Comments
Bhutan Today’s headline this morning was shocking. “People living in miserable conditions: OL” it screamed. Shocking! But not quite true. The recent earthquake destroyed many houses. According to government reports more than 4000 houses have been damaged. So many people are unhappy. And they are frightened. And they are impatient. They want the authorities to finalize their insurance claims, so that they can start dismantling and rebuilding their homes before aftershocks inflict further damage to them. In the meantime, people whose houses have been destroyed beyond repair or are no longer safe, are living in makeshift tents, in temporary…

Informing people

May 3, 2011Posted inMedia6 Comments
Today’s banner features 75-year old Jabari Dan Rai who hails from Dumtoe, a remote gewog in Samtse. By seven every morning, this remarkably healthy septuagenarian arrives at the Lungtenampa bridge to distribute that day’s newspapers to pedestrians making their ways to school and work. Bhutan’s media has come a long way. From very humble beginnings in 1967 when Kuensel was started as a government gazette, we now have at least 9 newspapers, 7 radio stations, a TV broadcaster and a growing number of new media sites. Today’s banner is a simple way of expressing my gratitude to our media,…

National speaker?

April 21, 2011Posted inLegislature, Media14 Comments
Yesterday, members of the National Assembly met to discuss the preliminary agenda for the Assembly’s next session. During the discussions, the members also considered if the entire proceedings of the National Assembly should once again be broadcast on live TV. After exchanging the same old arguments – from the need to promote transparency by those favoring live TV, to the importance of preventing the public from influencing legislative debate by those against live TV – the members passed the buck to their speaker. The Constitution and the National Assembly Act both empower the Speaker to prevent the media from…