TRIBUTE: By Mouzinho Lopes de Araujo
The world has lost a giant with the passing of Australian media legend Bob Howarth. He was 81.
He was a passionate advocate for journalism who changed many lives with his extraordinary kindness and generosity coupled with wisdom, experience and an uncanny ability to make things happen.
Howarth worked for major daily newspapers in his native Australia and around the world, having a particularly powerful impact on the Asia Pacific region.
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I first met Bob Howarth in 2001 in Timor-Leste during the nation’s first election campaign after the hard-won independence vote.
We met in the newsroom of the Timor Post, a daily newspaper he had been instrumental in setting up.
I was doing my journalism training there when Howarth was asked to tell the trainees about his considerable experience. It was only a short conversation, but his words and body language captivated me.
He was a born storyteller.
Role in the Timor-Post
I later found out about his role in the birth of the Timor Post, the newly independent nation’s first daily newspaper.
In early 2000, after hearing Timorese journalists lacked even the most basic equipment needed to do their jobs, he hatched a plan to get non-Y2K-compliant PCs, laptops and laser printers from Queensland Newspapers over to Dili.
And, despite considerable hurdles, he got it done. Then his bosses sent Howarth himself over to help a team of 14 Timorese journalists set up the Post.
The first publication of the Timor Post occurred during the historic visit of Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid to Timor-Leste in February 2000.
A media mass for Bob Howarth in Timor-Leste Video: Timor Post
In that first edition, Bob Howarth wrote an editorial in English, entitled “Welcome Mr Wahid”, accompanied by photos of President Wahid and Timorese national hero Xanana Gusmão. That article was framed and proudly hangs on the wall at the Timor Post offices to this day.
After Bob Howarth left Timor-Leste, he delivered some life-changing news to the Timor Post — he wanted to sponsor a journalist from the newspaper to study in Papua New Guinea. The owners chose me.
In 2002, I went with another Timorese student sponsored by Howarth to study journalism at Divine Word University in Madang on PNG’s north coast.
Work experience at the Post-Courier
During our time in PNG, we began to see the true extent of Howarth’s kindness. During every university holiday we would fly to Port Moresby to stay with him and get work experience at the Post-Courier, where Bob was managing director and publisher.
Our relationship became stronger and stronger. Sometimes we would sit down, have some drinks and I’d ask him questions about journalism and he would generously answer them in his wise and entertaining way.
In 2005, I went back to Timor-Leste and I went back to the Timor Post as political reporter.
When the owners of the Post appointed me editor-in chief in the middle of 2007, at the age of 28, I contacted Bob for advice and training support, with the backing of the Post’s new director, Jose Ximenes. That year I went to Melbourne to attend journalism training organised by the Asia Pacific Journalism Centre.
I then flew to the Gold Coast and stayed for two days with Bob Howarth and Di at their beautiful Miami home.
“Congratulations, Mouzy, for becoming the new editor-in-chief of the Post,” said Bob Howarth as he shook my hand, looking so proud. But I replied: “Bob, I need your help.”
He said, “Beer first, mate” — one of his favourite sayings — and then we discussed how he could help. He said he would try his best to bring some used laptops for Timor Post when he came to Dili to provide some training.
Arrival of laptops
True to his word, in early 2008 he and one of his long-time friends, veteran journalist Gary Evans, arrived in Dili with said laptops, delivered the training and helped set up business plans.
After I left the Post in 2010, I planned with some friends to set up a new daily newspaper called the Independente. Of course, I went to Bob for ideas and advice.
On a personal note, without Bob Howarth I may never have met my wife Jen, an Aussie Queensland University of Technology student who travelled to Madang in 2004 on a research trip. Bob and Di represented my family in Timor-Leste at our engagement party on the Gold Coast in 2010.
Jen moved to Dili at the end of that year and was part of the launch of Independente in 2011.
In the paper’s early days Howarth and Evans came back to Dili to train our journalists. He then also worked with the Timor-Leste Press Council and UNDP to provide training to many journalists in Dili.
Before he got sick, the owners and founders of the Timor Post paid tribute to Bob Howarth as “the father of the Timor Post” at the paper’s 20th anniversary celebrations in 2020 because of his contributions.
He and the Timor Post’s former director had a special friendship. Howarth was the godfather for Da Costa’s daughter, Stefania Howarth Da Costa.
30 visits to Timor-Leste
During his lifetime Bob Howarth visited Timor-Leste more than 30 times. He said many times that Timor-Leste was his second home after Australia.
After the news of his passing after a three-and-a-half-year battle with cancer was received by his friends at the Independente and the Timor Post on November 13, the Facebook walls of many in the Timorese media were adorned with words of sadness.
Both the Timor Post and the Independente organised a special mass in Bob Howarth’s honour.
He has left us forever but his legacy will be always with us.
May your soul rest in peace, Bob Howarth.
Mouzinho Lopes de Araujo is former editor-in-chief of the Timor Post and editorial director of the Independente in Timor-Leste, and is currently living in Brisbane with his wife Jen and their two boys, Enzo and Rafael.
