Tempo Semanal editor Jose Belo … Timor-Leste heading into a state of self-censorship. Image: Shannon Gillies/PMC

Pacific Scoop:
Report – By Shannon Gillies

Media will be silenced and the people will lose their voice if a controversial new Media Law is ratified in one of the Asia Pacific’s newest countries.

Timor Leste’s Parliament on May 6 passed a law that could see local journalists forced to be licensed and foreign reporters blocked at the border.

It has not yet been ratified by President Taur Matan Ruak who has referred the legislation to the Court of Appeal to review the legislation’s constitutionality. Read more »

West Papua journalist and editor Victor Mambor (second from left) with members of the West Papua Action Auckland and Pacific Media Centre during a visit to the PMC office in Auckland. Image: Del Abcede/PMC

Pacific Scoop:
Report – By Anna Majavu

New Zealand Police Minister Anne Tolley and Defence Minister Dr Jonathan Coleman must meet with the first West Papuan journalist to visit New Zealand, says a spokesperson for West Papua Action Auckland.

Victor Mambor, 39, editor of the Jayapura-based newspaper and website Tabloid Jubi, and chairperson of West Papua’s Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI) is in New Zealand this week and visited the Pacific Media Centre yesterday.

He will also address a seminar on “West Papua: The Pacific’s secret shame” in Auckland at the weekend. Read more »

Coalition for Democracy in Fiji spokesman Nik Naidu and his family at yesterday’s pro-Palestinian rally in Auckland. Image: Del Abcede/PMC

Pacific Scoop:
Report – By the PMC news desk

Thousands of protesters took to the streets in the New Zealand cities of Auckland and Wellington yesterday, as major demonstrations across the globe denounced the Israeli military aggression against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip in a largely one-sided conflict.

Many placards at the Auckland demostration condemned the Israeli “genocide” and “terrorism”.

Palestinian and other New Zealand families were out in force for the demonstrations to emphasise the high death rate of children in the past two weeks of attacks on the people of Gaza. Read more »

President-elect Joko Widodo (right) speaks with reporters at his office in Jakarta before the presidential election. Image: Saw Yan Naing / The Irrawaddy

Pacific Scoop:
Report – By Saw Yan Naing

For Indonesia’s President-elect front-runner, a campaign to alleviate poverty in the Indonesian capital has been largely personal, stemming in part from his own experiences as a child.

Joko Widodo, better known by his nickname Jokowi, is the governor of Jakarta and has narrowly won the Indonesian presidency, but he traces his roots back to the small Central Java city of Solo, where he grew up as the son of a furniture maker and lived with his family in a rented shack.

He later earned an engineering degree and entered the family furniture business, before shifting to politics and making a name for himself as mayor of Solo from 2005 to 2012. Read more »

Kanak environmental campaigner Florent Eurisouké tells of mining company “dirty tricks” at premiere of Cap Bocage. Image: Del Abcede/PMC

Pacific Scoop:
Report – By Anna Majavu

Indigenous Kanak people in the Cap Bocage area of New Caledonia have “lived in mud and shit for 30 years” as a result of the actions of the Ballande family mining group, a new environmental documentary film reveals.

Cap Bocage: When A Mountain Fell Into The Sea held its world premiere in Auckland at the New Zealand International Film Festival this week.

Directed by AUT television and screen production lecturer and filmmaker Jim Marbrook, the documentary features Kanak environmental activist Florent Eurisouké as he campaigns in an attempt to hold Ballande accountable over a devastating mudslide which polluted a pristine coral reef. Read more »

FLNKS representative Jimmy Naouma and MSG Corporate Development Officer Rose Wete. Image: Jane Mahoney/QUT Journalism

Pacific Scoop:
Report – By Harriet Harvey in Noumea

The Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) wants joint action within the Pacific region on three key issues - independence for New Caledonia, reviving the denuclearisation debate, and pressing for international action on climate change.

It is a so-called “mini United Nations”, taking in four governments – Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu – together with the Kanak liberation movement from New Caledonia, the FLNKS. The MSG credo is that each country needs the others, especially to have any kind of voice in world forums, where major powers dominate.

The body got into dispute with the French government ruling New Caledonia, by deciding as early as 1988 that the FLNKS, not France, would be admitted to membership. Read more »

The “president” of Papua, Forkorus Yaboisembut, at Jayapura District Court in 2012. Photo: Jakarta Globe / Antara

Pacific Scoop: Report – By Katharina R. Lestari in Jakarta

Five West Papuan political prisoners have been released after serving three-year sentences in a Jayapura prison.

The activists were arrested in October 2011 for reading out a “declaration of independence” from Indonesia. They were released yesterday.

“Those released included prominent tribal leader Forkorus Yaboisembut, who was declared “president of the Federal Republic of West Papua” during the 2011 declaration of independence event; Edison Waromi, who was declared prime minister; as well as Agustinus Sanany Kraar, Selpius Bobii and Dominikus Sorbet. Read more »

A still from the documentary Cap Bocage. Image: Jim Marbrook

Pacific Scoop:
Report – By Pacific Media Watch

A groundbreaking documentary about a coastal Kanak community and the pollution of their traditional fishing grounds in New Caledonia will be premiered at the New Zealand International Film Festival next month.

Cap Bocage, named after the tribal location in the north-east of Grand Terre island, is directed by New Zealand filmmaker and television lecturer at AUT University Jim Marbrook, and climaxes a project that began in 2007 and has involved many trips to New Caledonia.

The 74-minute documentary in both English and French languages is a close-up exploration of the forces that came into play when environmental issues and indigenous rights became intertwined in New Caledonia. Read more »

Inside the televised media debate in the Timor-Leste capital of Dili. Image: Shannon Gillies/PMC

Pacific Scoop:
Special Report – By Shannon Gillies in Dili

Confusion reigns over a controversial media law adopted by Parliament but yet to be promulgated in the fledgling Asia-Pacific democracy of Timor-Leste.

Timor-Leste parliamentarians have adopted a new media law that does not differentiate between journalists and social media users, will impose licensing for journalists and a narrow definition of a “journalist” and potentially bars foreign journalists.

Journalists are expected to fall into line with the government’s media definitions and foreign reporters could be blocked at the country’s borders. Read more »

West Papua’s giant Freeport mine … uncertain future. Image: Free West Papua

Pacific Scoop:
Report – By Sita W. Dewi and Hasyim Widhiarto in Jakarta and Tasikmalaya

Presidential candidates Joko “Jokowi” Widodo and Prabowo Subianto have dodged politically sensitive questions over the need to extend the contract of PT Freeport Indonesia in the West Papua region to mine the world’s largest gold deposit in Papua.

When asked on the campaign trail in Tasikmalaya, West Java, about his take on Freeport, Jokowi merely said that Freeport’s extension demand was not an issue that needed to be immediately resolved.

“Do you know what year it is now? I will have all the time in the world to take a stance on that,” said Jokowi. Read more »