VIDEO: HOW CAN GOVT GIVE AUTHORITY IT DOESN’T HAVE? – RANIL

June 22, 2013 

Opposition Leader Ranil Wickramasinghe today stated that controlling media is not the government’s duty and that the Executive has no say over it. 

“As far as I know controlling the media is not the duty of the government. The executive does not have authority,” he told reporters outside the Kollupitiya Walukarama Buddhist Temple. 

Wickaramasinghe today handed over the constitution proposal drafted by the UNP to the Mahanayaka of the Kotte Sri Kalyani Samagri Sangha Sabha Most Ven. Bellana Gnanawimala Thera.

On the code of media ethics proposed by the government, he stated that constitutional laws pertaining to the media are created after discussing it with media persons and organizations.  

Referring the President Rajapaksa’s comments that an all inclusive code-of-ethics for media should emerge from within the media industry itself, Ranil stated that the government is now saying it will give the media the authority to come up with a code-of-ethics for itself. 

“How can the government provide an authority which it doesn’t have?,” he questioned while emphasizing that the executive does not have the authority to control the media. 

The Parliament can construct law pertaining to the media, but as a tradition it is done by discussing with the media or by obtaining public opinions, he said.  

Reiterating that the executive has no right to control the media or to tell them they have been given the right, the UNP leader said: “media rights can be given back only if it has already been taken away.”  

UNP MP Fernado calls for code of ethics for media

... denies having proposed reintroduction of criminal defamation

by Zacki Jabbar-

June 21, 2013, 9:06 pm 

While the government has alleged that the UNP had proposed the reintroduction of Criminal defamation, UNP MP Harin Fernando said yesterday that his proposal to the Parliamentary Select Committee on the Media had been distorted.

He told The Island that what he had suggested to the PSC was the introduction of a code of ethics for the media since some slanderous articles were being published under pseudonyms.

"Minister Anura Priyadharshana Yapa seconded my proposal saying that it was a good idea," Fernando said, observing that at no stage had he proposed that criminal defamation be reintroduced.

MP Fernando said: "I also said the state media was being abused. It was said in the presence of several State media heads."

The MP noted there was a need for a code of ethics for the media as the Press Council had failed.

"My proposal was aimed at reigning in pseudo journalists who were nothing more than armchair critics resorting to mud slinging under the cover of pseudonyms," MP Fernando said.