Academic freedom – Asia Pacific Report

Antisemitism or anti-Zionism? Sydney Uni pressure to silence Israel, apartheid critics

Wendy Bacon — Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:27:11 +0000

University of Sydney’s appointment of pro-Israel academic Michael Abrahams-Sprod as antisemitism adviser has exposed management to an embarrassing conflict in its approach to freedom of expression. Wendy Bacon reports for Michael West Media.

SPECIAL REPORT: By Wendy Bacon in Sydney

While University of Sydney antisemitism adviser Dr Michael Abrahams-Sprod works in vice-chancellor Mark Scott’s office as its “resident expert” delivering training courses to stamp out what he sees as antisemitism, his close colleagues in the Australian Academic Alliance Against Antisemitism are embroiled in legal action against the university in the Federal Court.

They have accused the university of being liable for alleged racial vilification by its employees, Professor John Keane and linguist and vice-president of the USyd National Tertiary Education Union, Dr Nick Riemer, both of whom are pro-Palestinian.

The case will have significant implications for freedom of speech

and whether the law equates rejection of Israel’s genocide and anti-Zionism to antisemitism.

Conflicts of interest and the 5A
Although Abrahams-Sprod is not a party to the case, he was a driving force behind complaints that led to the case, and letters that he signed are being used as evidence against the university.

Alongside its academics, the university is defending the action. So far its case depends on an interpretation of antisemitism that is in direct conflict with the views of 5A and Abrahams-Sprod, who is already teaching his courses for frontline administrative staff, some of whom deal with complaints against students and staff.

Three of five applicants in the court case are members of 5A. One is emeritus professor Suzanne Rutland, a longtime close colleague of Abrahams-Sprod. Rutland is on the board of Australian Academic Alliance Against Antisemitism (5A) of which Abrahams-Sprod was campus coordinator between November 2023 and February 26 2025, and remains a member.

She is also on the board of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. Another complainant belongs to the pro-Israel Australian Jewish Association of Students, which Abrahams-Sprod assisted in making complaints.

According to 5A, anti-Zionism is antisemitism.

Its extreme views are revealed in parliamentary submissions, including one for the inquiry into measures to prohibit slogans that incite hatred, which was co-authored by Rutland.

Conflating antisemitism with anti-Zionism
5A’s submission recommends prohibiting a wide range of slogans that are regularly used at pro-Palestinian protests. For example, it lists “Settlers, settlers go back home! Palestine is our home!” as a call for genocide of Israelis, and

accusations that Israel is causing ‘starvation’ in Gaza as a genocidal libel.

It supports a dangerous notion of “cumulative harm” that would see police trained to understand that protests or slogans that individually might appear lawful if repeated can become unlawful intimidation.

It recommends a new agency to operate a “centralised, anonymous complaints system to capture antisemitic incidents, chants, symbols, and patterns of conduct, including behaviour that may not individually meet prosecution thresholds.”

Its clear goal is to silence opposition to Israel’s genocide, apartheid and other war crimes.

In contrast to 5A’s views, USyd’s lawyers, led by Robert Dick SC have argued in the Federal Court that anti-Zionism is not antisemitism. In fact, they have even relied on a letter to Overland journal signed by more than 50 Jewish academics and current students, repudiating “the attempt by those making the complaint to conflate Zionism, a political ideology with Jewish and non-Jewish adherents, with Jewish identity.”

Campaign to silence critics of Israel
The complaints against Riemer and Keane were part of “concerted and coordinated efforts to silence critics of Israel across Australia’s university campuses and public squares, trammelling fundamental democratic rights of assembly, protest, expression, and dissent”, they wrote.

At the time when USyd’s submissions were filed last year, unbeknownst to staff, the university was already covering part of Abrahams-Sprod’s salary to work with Special Envoy Jillian Segal on a project developing antisemitism training.

Abraham-Sprod took up his new two-year position in the vice-chancellor’s office in January, although it was not approved by the Senate’s People, Culture and Safety Committee until late March.

Michael West Media asked the university:

“Did the Senate Committee discuss the issue of whether there could be a conflict of interest in appointing Abrahams-Sprod to work with the vice-chancellor on anti-semitism training?

“Does the university agree that there is a perceived conflict of interest? And if so, why did the university proceed with the appointment?”

In response to questions from MWM, a university spokesperson (we requested a name but were not given one) declined to disclose confidential committee discussions and stated:

“Dr Abrahams-Sprod will provide advice and perspectives rather than being involved in decision-making on issues relating to antisemitism, and so we don’t consider there to be a conflict of interest.

“His work will complement other university initiatives aimed at maintaining a civic environment that supports academic freedom and freedom of speech, while ensuring a safe and inclusive campus for all.”

It would seem from this response that the university understands that there is a potential conflict but avoids it by separating “influence” from “decision making”.

Like all jobs, Abrahams-Sprod’s position will involve decision-making as well as influencing others’ decisions. The response undercuts the university’s description of Abrahams-Sprod as possessing “unique qualities” and being the “resident expert”.

Israel lobby’s long-term funding of Uni
Few, if any, Australian humanities departments have been so generously funded by private interests as USyd’s field of Hebrew, Biblical & Jewish Studies.

In part one yesterday, we reported that Abrahams-Sprod’s lectureship is funded by Roth family foundations, which include John, who is married to the Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism, Jillian Segal, and Charmaine and Stanley Roth, a leading Zionist fundraiser who died in January this year.

Further investigation reveals an astonishing integration of Hebrew, Biblical & Jewish Studies with the pro-Israel Zionist establishment of Sydney.

The department always partnered with the Jewish Higher Education Fund (JHEF), which is a registered charity. Stanley Roth was a trustee of JHEF since it was established in 1981.

The ACNC website lists the address of the charity as the Department at Sydney University, but its email contact is pwertheim@ecaj.com.au. Peter Wertheim is the co-CEO of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry.

He has chaired the fund since 1997, along with many other duties, including chair of the Jewish Board of Deputies (1996-2000). and co-CEO of ECAJ (2009 -2026). The JHEF is one of the organisations that are supported by the Jewish Communal Appeal, of which Jillian Segal was recently elected a director.

In 2018/19, the department and JHEF produced a report in which it acknowledged that “it’s only due to [the fund’s] generosity that we can plan for the future growth and development …”. The report stressed the importance of the Department’s work in combatting “polemical attacks against Israel’s legitimacy as a nation state” and “falsification of Jewish history, including calls for the BDS” to maintain “integrity of discourse about Israel and the Jewish people.”

The report celebrated the department’s achievements in stitching Australia into the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) and its definition of antisemitism.

The money flow
The funds flow as needed with JHEF making annual contributions of between $450,000 and $700,000 covering lectureships, casual teaching staff and administration costs, and links with Israeli universities.

The department thanked their donors “without which the department would have no future,” including the Pratt Foundation, the Roth Family and the Isaac and Susan Wakil family foundation. The Wakil Foundation is among the most generous donors in the history of USyd, providing more than $66 million for health buildings and scholarships, apart from smaller amounts contributed to Abraham-Sprod’s department.

MWM is not suggesting that there is anything wrong with private philanthropy, which is highly valued in the context of diminishing public funds.

Michael Abrahams-Sprod has a strong teaching record.

But is a person whose academic career has depended on some of Australia’s most powerful Zionists an appropriate choice for a “resident expert” tasked with embedding interpretations of antisemitism that the university itself argues threaten academic freedom?

Academic freedom at stake
NSW Council for Civil Liberties president Tim Roberts says, “Abrahams-Sprod’s appointment is another example of employment procedures being used across our community to silence political communication.

“By employing an advisor with such a ‘partisan perspective’, the university undermines community confidence that any conduct proceedings will be undertaken in good faith and without an apprehension of bias. This should be intolerable for any academic institution,” he said.

No one can deny that there is racism on campus, including Islamophobia, First Nations racism and antisemitism. Pro-Israeli students and staff are undeniably upset by pro-Palestinian activity. But 5A’s intentions are to silence pro-Palestinian activism.

In fact, some argue that nationalistic Zionism is itself a form of racism.

What about Arabic background staff and students who feel upset by USyd’s privileging the views of 5A academics about antisemitism before any anti-racism framework has been developed?

Abrahams-Sprod is training staff to exercise administrative power, which can have big consequences, although it is often hidden and very hard to challenge.

According to USyd, Abrahams-Sprod will “consult with all relevant communities and stakeholders in his work as special advisor”. But what does this mean when the courses are already underway without two big stakeholders — the Student Representative Council or the NTEU — even being consulted?

The SRC opposes the appointment. SRC vice-president and co-convenor of Students for Palestine, Shovan Bhattarai, says it will “entrench a trend towards more authoritarianism” against hundreds of students who are “supporting campaigns against the university’s complicity in genocide.”

Protests are still permitted but the university must be notified as soon as they are announced. Posters and banners are banned except in designated spaces. Anything less than full compliance can lead to disciplinary action, which students are forbidden to speak about publicly.

Censoring links to MWM and Overland stories
At an online staff “townhall” on March 2, there was more support for discussion about antisemitism training than any other topic. Afterwards, Honi Soit reported that Dr Riemer and historian Dr David Brophy, both members of University of Sydney Staff for Palestine, posted very brief comments and links on the staff internal platform.

Neither were informed when their posts were quickly removed. Riemer expressed his concern that the training could stigmatise Palestinian staff and students, and linked his post to this MWM story. Brophy published a link to an article he wrote for Overland journal.

They were found to have posted material “reasonably perceived as inflammatory or having the potential to incite others, including other users” — a finding which they vehemently reject as interfering with their academic freedom. Riemer’s complaint against this treatment was dismissed.

The university refused to identify the decision-makers.

A disturbing exercise of hidden power, but an undoubted win for the 5A approach and the Zionist funders.

Part one of this series was republished from Michael West Media yesterday with permission, it is here.

Wendy Bacon is an investigative journalist who was professor of journalism at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). She worked for Fairfax, Channel Nine and SBS and has published in The Guardian, New Matilda, City Hub and Overland. She has a long history in promoting independent and alternative journalism. She is a long-term supporter of a peaceful BDS and the Greens.

Sydney Uni appoints antisemitism ‘lecturer’, forgets to tell anybody

Wendy Bacon — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 05:41:36 +0000

University of Sydney’s vice-chancellor Mark Scott appointed a special advisor for the institution’s antisemitism training programme, but forgot to tell anyone until months later. The first of a two-part series on Zionist influence in Australian universities for Michael West Media.

By Wendy Bacon and Cathy Peters in Sydney

The person chosen for the role of Sydney University’s antisemitism chief is Michael Abrahams-Sprod, chair of Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish Studies. His role is to help roll out a training programme for “front-line” staff on issues facing the Jewish community, including antisemitism in “contemporary settings”.

University staff only learned about the appointment through a staff intranet notice earlier this month. A university spokesperson told Michael West Media that Abrahams-Sprod’s new position began on January 1, 2026 and continues until December 2027.

Asked to specify the date the position was approved and from whom the vice-chancellor sought advice, the spokesperson said it was approved on the recommendation of the USyd Senate People, Culture and Safety Committee on March 6, 2026.

READ MORE: Pro-Zionism influence at universities

This was two months after Abrahams-Sprod started his special advisor job. He was previously campus coordinator of Sydney University’s branch of the pro-Israel Australian Academic Alliance Against Antisemitism and works alongside the Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism, Jillian Segal.

This MWM investigation can also reveal that even before his new appointment, Abrahams-Sprod was funded to work on anti-semitism issues by the University.

In 2025, he worked on a collaboration with the Special Antisemitism Envoy, Jillian Segal, and the Sydney Jewish Museum, developing an antisemitism awareness training programme funded by the Universities of Sydney and Melbourne.

Antisemitism training programme
In his new role, Abrahams-Sprod will co-deliver 12 sessions with the Sydney Jewish Museum to 120 USyd staff in key areas including Human Resources, Protective and Risk Services, the Student Affairs Unit and the Office of the Vice-Chancellor.

These key front-line staff administer policies, communicate with staff and students staff and respond to complaints.

After completing the training of administrative staff, Abrahams-Sprod will advise on training for all staff within an “overarching anti-racism framework … to align with the expectations of the Australian Human Rights Commission”.

In response to MWM questions, a spokesperson said that Abrahams-Sprod’s appointment recognised “his unique skills and experience, ongoing work supporting our Jewish and broader community and his existing role as an academic leader at the University.”

He will “consult with relevant communities … on how to tackle antisemitism and other forms of discrimination and build a campus that’s safe and welcoming to all”.

Abrahams-Sprod’s appointment is a win for the pro-Israeli lobby.

Equally, it aims to silence other staff and students and deter protests in support of Palestine.

Claims of exceptionalism
Last week, USyd Staff for Palestine called on Mark Scott to reverse the Special Advisor appointment and abolish the role.

They accused the university of “exceptionalism” and drew attention to a recent Australian Human Rights Commission finding of high rates of racism experienced by students and staff from First Nations, African, Asian, Jewish, Māori, Middle Eastern, Muslim, Palestinian and Pasifika backgrounds.

In an open letter, they stated that “in creating a unique special advisor role for antisemitism, the university has signalled that racism against Jewish people is being uniquely prioritised above other forms of discrimination”.

Abrahams-Sprod will work across the university sector to fulfill requirements of Segal-appointed former conservative Australian Catholic University VC Greg Craven, who has been tasked to oversee her punitive universities Report Card initiative.

As reported in The Guardian, Craven accused universities of being a ”major factor in making antisemitism respectful” and referred to campus protesters as “mutant radical groups”. Government funding could be withheld from universities found to “facilitate, enable or fail to act against antisemitism.”

Jillian Segal’s Plan to Combat Antisemitism makes sweeping claims about antisemitism in Australian universities, which have been strongly critiqued by the Australian Human Rights Institute.

The assessment will be based on the contentious IHRA definition of antisemitism. This definition is rejected by many Australian university staff and students, including Jews and students from Middle East backgrounds whose families deal with the daily horror of Israel’s genocide, violent occupation, bombings, denial of humanitarian aid and other war crimes.

Bowing to Zionist pressure
Abrahams-Sprod’s appointment can be seen as a response to continuous pressure from October 2023 onwards from Abrahams-Sprod and fellow Zionist staff members on senior university managers to discipline staff and students for pro-Palestinian advocacy. Zionist leaders described ($) Scott as

“arrogant and dismissive” at a meeting in April 2024.

Their anger against anti-Israel sentiment grew after a student encampment began that month.

Scott’s initial reaction was to maintain neutrality regarding the protest, assuring the university community that he understood the right of protesters to peacefully assemble and the right of free speech.

However, by July 2024, after the two-month Gaza encampment had disbanded, USyd launched into defensive action, introducing its new Campus Access Policy, which clamped down heavily on future student or staff protests and political speech.

This policy was strongly criticised, including by the university’s Law School, which published this open letter.

Bowing further to orchestrated pressure on Scott and the university, it then commissioned an external review by Bruce Hodgkinson AM SC about the university’s handling of claims of campus antisemitism in relation to the encampment. The External Review Report made 15 recommendations, including strengthening the restrictions on protests and the imposition of a New Civility Rule with strong penalties for breaching it.

In September 2024, a contrite Mark Scott apologised to Jewish students and staff at a Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee Inquiry for “failing them” in his handling of the encampment.

But key lobbyists, including Zionist Federation of Australia president Jeremy Liebler, said Scott had lost credibility and continued to call for his resignation. Scott publicly promised ($) to fix the situation.

One of the ways to “fix” the situation appears to have been to

turn the coordinator of the Zionist complaints into a leader in his own office.

Australian Academic Alliance Against Antisemitism (5A)
When announcing Abrahams-Sprod’s appointment to all university staff earlier this month, Scott praised the “wealth of knowledge, experience and critical expertise” that Abrahams-Sprod brings to the new role. He did not mention his activities as the coordinator of the Australian Academic Alliance Against Antisemitism (5A).

5A is a network of academics working to counter antisemitism in universities and medical institutions that was formed in November 2023. It claimed in its opening statement to the NSW Inquiry into Antisemitism that, “they [Jews] are hated because of their nation state, Israel. Anti-Zionism is the new antisemitism disguised as wine but truly an old poison, rebottled, labelled with new academic terminologies that misrepresent and deceive.”

5A’s linking of Jewish identity with the state of Israel, its misrepresentation of anti-Zionism and the BDS movement are antisemitic strategies that the Israeli government has generated over many years to deflect and misconstrue focus on Israel’s war crimes and crimes against humanity.

It claims that campuses post October 7, 2023, became “epicentres of antisemitic activism” and that this was rooted in “protests, university encampments and cancel culture.”

This puts it on a collision course with thousands of pro-Palestinian and human rights focussed staff and students.

In his role as coordinator, Abrahams-Sprod collated at least 100 complaints against fellow staff and students, many of whom he assisted. This puts him at the centre of the campaign to pressure Scott. According to 5A, the number of complaints emanating from USyd far exceeded the minuscule number submitted from the other four large universities in Sydney.

5A labelled campus protests as antisemitic because they “delegitimise the state of Israel”. Similarly, stating that Israel is an apartheid state or that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza is also considered antisemitic, even though these are widely accepted findings of UN inquiries and international lawyers.

The Roth/Segal connection
Abrahams-Sprod is also connected to Jillian Segal through the funding of his own senior lectureship. Segal is married to property developer John Roth and was the sister-in-law of Stanley Roth, who died in January this year.

For more than 20 years, charitable foundations associated with the Roth family, along with several other philanthropists, have helped fund the discipline of Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish Studies.

In November 2024, the Roth family established the Roth Senior Lectureship in Jewish Civilisation, Education and Israel Studies to which Abrahams-Sprod was appointed. The university spokesperson said that the funders played no role in his selection.

In addition, the Roth family has provided funding to Youth Mental Health at the University of Sydney’s Brain and Mind Centre.

After his death, Stanley Roth was celebrated as one of Australia’s strongest supporters and most generous funders of Israel. The brothers also received widespread publicity as directors of Henroth Investments, which donated $50,000 to the far-right group Advance Australia in 2023/4.

Given Abrahams-Sprod’s highly partisan role, his appointment will only stoke division rather than build a safe and civil environment on campus. Staff for Palestine has accused the university management of being “hijacked by supporters of Israel”.

But VC Scott’s appointment has done more than signal his capitulation to the pro-Israel pressure and disdain for the pro-Palestinian supporters.

As we will explore in part two tomorrow, it also raises conflict-of-interest issues for the university.

Wendy Bacon is an investigative journalist who was professor of journalism at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). She worked for Fairfax, Channel Nine and SBS and has published in The Guardian, New Matilda, City Hub and Overland. She has a long history in promoting independent and alternative journalism. She is also a long-term supporter of a peaceful BDS and the Greens.

Cathy Peters is a former ABC RN producer/executive producer and Greens councillor on the former Marrickville Council. She also worked for a state Greens MP and is a long-time advocate for Palestinian rights. In 2014, she co-founded PSNA/BDS Australia. She has Jewish heritage, has travelled and volunteered in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

Republished from Michael West Media with permission.

‘Antisemitism training’ at universities. Labor’s march to authoritarianism

APR editor — Thu, 19 Feb 2026 09:37:14 +0000

From curbing protests to controlling what can be said in Australia, state and Federal Labor governments are becoming authoritarian. Next in line is the thought police entering campus. Nick Riemer reports for Michael West Media.

ANALYSIS: By Nick Riemer

In December, the NSW Labor government gave itself the power to ban street marches for an indefinite period. We saw what that meant on February 9 as violent police charged, maced, beat and arrested protesters against Herzog’s visit.

In January, the federal ALP introduced new hate speech laws, which confer unprecedented discretion on the government to criminalise speech and groups to which it objects.

Now, in a further stride down its authoritarian road, the federal government is reported to be proceeding with plans for “political training” for Australian university staff.

Academic and unionist Nick Riemer . . . “The reforms threaten to fundamentally alter the character of Australian society, which will become more autocratic, more racist, less rational and less free.” Image: MWM

According to several recent reports, the federal government has agreed that “antisemitism training” will be a “key” area in which universities’ response to antisemitism will be assessed.

University employees will, apparently, be required to undergo indoctrination in the ideology of the pro-Israel lobby, which identifies Zionism and Judaism and treats critics of Israel as likely antisemites.

The training will involve “understanding of Jewish peoplehood, their attachment to Israel and identity beyond faith” — the characteristically unclear phrasing of the government’s Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism, Jillian Segal, who is responsible for the “Antisemitism report card” plan.

The thought police
Compulsory training in a political ideology befits a police state, not a notional democracy — a status that NSW Premier Chris Minns, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the rest of the political establishment are undermining like none before them.

Amidst the uproar over Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s visit, the move has not had the discussion it deserves. Requiring university staff to undergo “training” in the ideology of Israeli apartheid is as unacceptable as it would have been to require training in that of South African apartheid or Hindu supremacism.

Compulsory training in any particular ideology — Zionism, fascism, liberalism — is a body blow against university independence.

Segal’s plan has been roundly criticised by the progressive side of politics, including by Jewish organisations, but has the support of the entire Zionist establishment and the major parties.

Stopping free inquiry
The plan was originally devised in mid-2025, but was put on hold after Segal was discredited by revelations of her family’s connections, through generous donations, with the far-right, anti-immigrant group Advance.

Now, the ALP appears to be implementing it. Under the obligatory cover of combating antisemitism, the training is clearly intended to further attack genocide opponents in higher education.

The measure shows a flagrant contempt for the basic role of universities in a supposedly liberal society — the necessary cliché that the campus is a place where controversial ideas can be expressed and discussed, no matter what powerful political actors they alienate.

Academic freedom is an ideal, not a reality, but it is still an essential principle of true intellectual work.

The extent to which it is observed is an indicator of the overall state of democracy in a country.

Little is currently known about how the antisemitism training will work in practice. Segal’s blueprint is — no doubt intentionally — extremely vague.

Regardless of the form it takes, the training is designed to elevate anti-Jewish hate above all other kinds of racism as especially deserving of redress — what other form of racism has its own training? — and to enforce Zionists’ chauvinistic insistence that they are the only Jews worthy of the name.

Both intentions are profoundly racist.

How the training will be assessed is also unclear. We have no knowledge of what the consequences would be for the many university staff who will refuse to participate in Zionist indoctrination. We also have no inkling of the size of the financial penalties against non-compliant universities that Segal, in full Trumpian mode, wants to apply.

According to Times Higher Education, they will be “significant”.

To the right of Trump
The current US administration has already mandated widespread student training designed to vilify Palestine solidarity as antisemitic. The Australian proposal of something similar for university staff puts Albanese and his government to the right of Trump.

The government has appointed Greg Craven, the former VC of the Australian Catholic University, as the political commissar responsible for the training and other elements of Segal’s “report card” process.

Craven has pooh-poohed the idea that cracking down on anti-Zionist speech could constitute any threat to civil liberties. The issue, he writes, is fundamentally one of “national defence”.

Albanese’s new hate speech laws, for example, are needed because our current legal and constitutional arrangements

are based on the assumption that our commonwealth faces no deadly external or internal threats.

Read that again. We are, Craven thinks, essentially at war. This means that we have to be the ones to suspend the basic democratic norms we love so much, because otherwise the jihadists will do it for us.

He sees pro-Palestinian critics of the hate speech laws as spreading “morally bankrupt intellectual effluent”.

“A couple of decades’ house arrest for Louise Adler,” he writes, is “appealing”. This is kind of right-wing trolling that, in 2026, equips someone to be entrusted by the ALP with the future of academic freedom in Australia.

University leaders can’t be trusted
Mass defiance of the training is the only feasible response. University authorities certainly cannot be trusted to push back. They have made it clear that they are perfectly willing to turn their institutions into Zionist propaganda mills.

Universities Australia welcomed Segal’s recommendations when they were first made in July; the supine Group of Eight has not raised a peep of protest against the political training proposal.

The training will, however, pose serious headaches for university managers. But, far from protesting, they might even welcome the opportunity to discipline Palestine-supporting staff, who are usually also at the forefront of union and other progressive campus activism.

Last year’s gratuitous purge of academics at Macquarie University disproportionately targeted Palestine supporters, union activists and women.

As decades of their imposition of cuts and austerity in the sector show, many vice-chancellors and their deputies are more than ready to sacrifice higher education wholesale, at any price. Their rewards are the prestige and salary that come with a career in senior university management.

In this year’s Australia Day honours, Professor Annamarie Jagose, the provost of the University of Sydney, was rewarded with an Order of Australia medal for “service to tertiary education”. She was far from the only university executive to get a gong.

Awarding this honour, at this moment, to the second-highest office holder at Sydney, which has led the way in its repression of anti-genocide activism, is not anodyne, and it is hard not to read it as a federal

reward for the university’s readiness to politically and ideologically serve the cause of genocide.

Police state on campus
Not content with feting Israel’s bomb-signing terrorist-in-chief, Albanese is also destroying the notional independence of the university system, imposing a political standard to which teaching and administrative staff must conform, and delivering campuses into the hands of a far-right lobby that is milking the 2025 atrocity at Bondi for all it is worth.

After Bondi, no authoritarian bridge seems too far for the ALP and Coalition. Crossing dangerous new frontiers in political repression will be the principal legacy of Anthony Albanese and his Labor colleagues.

Their reforms threaten to fundamentally alter the character of society, which will become more autocratic, more racist, less rational and less free.

Everyone who supports the reckless and bankrupt Labor Party is accountable.

During the genocide, universities have played the role of being a testing ground for repressive policies that were soon rolled out more widely.

Before the NSW government restricted street protests, Australian vice-chancellors restricted them on campus. The federal government’s hate speech laws were prefigured by crackdowns on anti-Zionist or pro-Palestinian expression in universities.

Under their supposedly “liberal” leadership, campuses have consistently trialled the next features of the Australian police state. Once Zionist political training has become established in universities,

there is nothing to stop it from being rolled out more widely.

Nick Riemer is a senior lecturer at the University of Sydney and academic vice-president of the university’s National Tertiary Education Union branch. A long-time Palestine activist, he is the author of Boycott Theory and the Struggle for Palestine. Available here. This article was first published by Michael West Media and is republished with permission.

Obama praises Harvard for ‘setting example’ to universities resisting Trump

APR editor — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 10:02:03 +0000

Asia Pacific Report

Former US President Barack Obama has taken to social media to praise Harvard’s decision to stand up for academic freedom by rebuffing the Trump administration’s demands.

“Harvard has set an example for other higher-ed institutions — rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom, while taking concrete steps to make sure all students at Harvard can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate and mutual respect,” Obama wrote in a post on X.

He called on other universities to follow the lead.

Harvard has set an example for other higher-ed institutions – rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom, while taking concrete steps to make sure all students at Harvard can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate and… https://t.co/gAu9UUqgjF

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) April 15, 2025

Harvard will not comply with the Trump administration’s demands to dismantle its diversity programming, limit student protests over Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, and submit to far-reaching federal audits in exchange for its federal funding, university president Alan M. Garber ’76 announced yesterday afternoon.

“No government — regardless of which party is in power — should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” he wrote, reports the university’s Harvard Crimson news team.

The announcement comes two weeks after three federal agencies announced a review into roughly $9 billion in Harvard’s federal funding and days after the Trump administration sent its initial demands, which included dismantling diversity programming, banning masks, and committing to “full cooperation” with the Department of Homeland Security.

Within hours of the announcement to reject the White House demands, the Trump administration paused $2.2 billion in multi-year grants and $60 million in multi-year contracts to Harvard in a dramatic escalation in its crusade against the university.

More focused demands
On Friday, the Trump administration had delivered a longer and more focused set of demands than the ones they had shared two weeks earlier.

It asked Harvard to “derecognise” pro-Palestine student groups, audit its academic programmes for viewpoint diversity, and expel students involved in an altercation at a 2023 pro-Palestine protest on the Harvard Business School campus.

It also asked Harvard to reform its admissions process for international students to screen for students “supportive of terrorism and anti-Semitism” — and immediately report international students to federal authorities if they break university conduct policies.

It called for “reducing the power held by faculty (whether tenured or untenured) and administrators more committed to activism than scholarship” and installing leaders committed to carrying out the administration’s demands.

And it asked the university to submit quarterly updates, beginning in June 2025, certifying its compliance.

Garber condemned the demands, calling them a “political ploy” disguised as an effort to address antisemitism on campus.

“It makes clear that the intention is not to work with us to address antisemitism in a cooperative and constructive manner,” he wrote.

“Although some of the demands outlined by the government are aimed at combating antisemitism, the majority represent direct governmental regulation of the ‘intellectual conditions’ at Harvard.”

The Harvard Crimson daily news, founded in 1873 . . . how it reported the universoity’s defiance of the Trump administration today. Image: HC screenshot APR

Free press under threat in US – Columbia J-School speaks out

Pacific Media Watch — Mon, 17 Mar 2025 21:33:27 +0000

Columbia Journalism School

Freedom of the press — a bedrock principle of American democracy — is under threat in the United States.

Here at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism we are witnessing and experiencing an alarming chill. We write to affirm our commitment to supporting and exercising First Amendment rights for students, faculty, and staff on our campus — and, indeed, for all.

After Homeland Security seized and detained Mahmoud Khalil, a recent graduate of Columbia’s School of Public and International Affairs, without charging him with any crime, many of our international students have felt afraid to come to classes and to events on campus.

They are right to be worried. Some of our faculty members and students who have covered the protests over the Gaza war have been the object of smear campaigns and targeted on the same sites that were used to bring Khalil to the attention of Homeland Security.

President Trump has warned that the effort to deport Khalil is just the first of many.

These actions represent threats against political speech and the ability of the American press to do its essential job and are part of a larger design to silence voices that are out of favour with the current administration.

We have also seen reports that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is trying to deport the Palestinian poet and journalist Mosab Abu Toha, who has written extensively in the New Yorker about the condition of the residents of Gaza and warned of the mortal danger to Palestinian journalists.

There are 13 million legal foreign residents (green card holders) in the United States. If the administration can deport Khalil, it means those 13 million people must live in fear if they dare speak up or publish something that runs afoul of government views.

There are more than one million international students in the United States. They, too, may worry that they are no longer free to speak their mind. Punishing even one person for their speech is meant to intimidate others into self-censorship.

One does not have to agree with the political opinions of any particular individual to understand that these threats cut to the core of what it means to live in a pluralistic democracy. The use of deportation to suppress foreign critics runs parallel to an aggressive campaign to use libel laws in novel — even outlandish ways — to silence or intimidate the independent press.

The President has sued CBS for an interview with Kamala Harris which Trump found too favourable. He has sued the Pulitzer Prize committee for awarding prizes to stories critical of him.

He has even sued the Des Moines Register for publishing the results of a pre-election poll that showed Kamala Harris ahead at that point in the state.

Large corporations like Disney and Meta settled lawsuits most lawyers thought they could win because they did not want to risk the wrath of the Trump administration and jeopardize business they have with the federal government.

Amazon and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos decided that the paper’s editorial pages would limit themselves to pieces celebrating “free markets and individual liberties.”

Meanwhile, the Trump administration insists on hand-picking the journalists who will be permitted to cover the White House and Pentagon, and it has banned the Associated Press from press briefings because the AP is following its own style book and refusing to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.

The Columbia Journalism School stands in defence of First Amendment principles of free speech and free press across the political spectrum. The actions we’ve outlined above jeopardise these principles and therefore the viability of our democracy. All who believe in these freedoms should steadfastly oppose the intimidation, harassment, and detention of individuals on the basis of their speech or their journalism.

The Faculty of Columbia Journalism School
New York

Australian university workers: ‘We will not be silenced over Palestine’

Pacific Media Watch — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 22:29:22 +0000

SPECIAL REPORT: By Markela Panegyres and Jonathan Strauss in Sydney

The new Universities Australia (UA) definition of antisemitism, endorsed last month for adoption by 39 Australian universities, is an ugly attempt to quash the pro-Palestine solidarity movement on campuses and to silence academics, university workers and students who critique Israel and Zionism.

While the Scott Morrison Coalition government first proposed tightening the definition, and a recent joint Labor-Coalition parliamentary committee recommended the same, it is yet another example of the Labor government’s overreach.

It seeks to mould discussion in universities to one that suits its pro-US and pro-Zionist imperialist agenda, while shielding Israel from accountability.

So far, the UA definition has been widely condemned.

Nasser Mashni, of Australia Palestine Advocacy Network, has slammed it as “McCarthyism reborn”.

The Jewish Council of Australia (JCA) has criticised it as “dangerous, politicised and unworkable”. The NSW Council of Civil Liberties said it poses “serious risks to freedom of expression and academic freedom”.

The UA definition comes in the context of a war against Palestinian activism on campuses.

The false claim that antisemitism is “rampant” across universities has been weaponised to subdue the Palestinian solidarity movement within higher education and, particularly, to snuff out any repeat of the student-led Gaza solidarity encampments, which sprung up on campuses across the country last year.

Some students and staff who have been protesting against the genocide since October 2023 have come under attack by university managements.

Some students have been threatened with suspension and many universities are giving themselves, through new policies, more powers to liaise with police and surveil students and staff.

Palestinian, Arab and Muslim academics, as well as other anti-racist scholars, have been silenced and disciplined, or face legal action on false counts of antisemitism, merely for criticising Israel’s genocidal war on Palestine.

Randa Abdel-Fattah, for example, has become the target of a Zionist smear campaign that has successfully managed to strip her of Australian Research Council funding.

Intensify repression
The UA definition will further intensify the ongoing repression of people’s rights on campuses to discuss racism, apartheid and occupation in historic Palestine.

By its own admission, UA acknowledges that its definition is informed by the antisemitism taskforces at Columbia University, Stanford University, Harvard University and New York University, which have meted out draconian and violent repression of pro-Palestine activism.

The catalyst for the new definition was the February 12 report tabled by Labor MP Josh Burns on antisemitism on Australian campuses. That urged universities to adopt a definition of antisemitism that “closely aligns” with the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition.

It should be noted that the controversial IHRA definition has been opposed by the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) for its serious challenge to academic freedom.

As many leading academics and university workers, including Jewish academics, have repeatedly stressed, criticism of Israel and criticism of Zionism is not antisemitic.

UA’s definition is arguably more detrimental to freedom of speech and pro-Palestine activism and scholarship than the IHRA definition.

In the vague IHRA definition, a number of examples of antisemitism are given that conflate criticism of Israel with antisemitism, but not the main text itself.

By contrast, the new UA definition overtly equates criticism of Israel and Zionism with antisemitism and claims Zionist ideology is a component part of Jewish identity.

The definition states that “criticism of Israel can be anti-Semitic . . . when it calls for the elimination of the State of Israel”.

Dangerously, anyone advocating for a single bi-national democratic state in historic Palestine will be labelled antisemitic under this new definition.

Anyone who justifiably questions the right of the ethnonationalist, apartheid and genocidal state of Israel to exist will be accused of antisemitism.

Sweeping claims
The UA definition also makes the sweeping claim that “for most, but not all Jewish Australians, Zionism is a core part of their Jewish identity”.

But, as the JCA points out, Zionism is a national political ideology and is not a core part of Jewish identity historically or today, since many Jews do not support Zionism. The JCA warns that the UA definition “risks fomenting harmful stereotypes that all Jewish people think in a certain way”.

Moreover, JCA said, Jewish identities are already “a rightly protected category under all racial discrimination laws, whereas political ideologies such as Zionism and support for Israel are not”.

Like other aspects of politics, political ideologies, such as Zionism, and political stances, such as support for Israel, should be able to be discussed critically.

According to the UA definition, criticism of Israel can be antisemitic “when it holds Jewish individuals or communities responsible for Israel’s actions”.

While it would be wrong for any individual or community, because they are Jewish, to be held responsible for Israel’s actions, it is a fact that the International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former minister Yoav Gallant for Israel’s war crimes and crimes against humanity.

But under the UA definition, since Netanyahu and Gallant are Jewish, would holding them responsible be considered antisemitic?

Is the ICC antisemitic? According to Israel it is.

The implication of the definition for universities, which teach law and jurisprudence, is that international law should not be applied to the Israeli state, because it is antisemitic to do so.

The UA’s definition is vague enough to have a chilling effect on any academic who wants to teach about genocide, apartheid and settler-colonialism. It states that “criticism of Israel can be antisemitic when it is grounded in harmful tropes, stereotypes or assumptions”.

What these are is not defined.

Anti-racism challenge
Within the academy, there is a strong tradition of anti-racism and decolonial scholarship, particularly the concept of settler colonialism, which, by definition, calls into question the very notion of “statehood”.

With this new definition of antisemitism, will academics be prevented from teaching students the works of Chelsea Watego, Patrick Wolfe or Edward Said?

The definition will have serious and damaging repercussions for decolonial scholars and severely impinges the rights of scholars, in particular First Nations scholars and students, to critique empire and colonisation.

UA is the “peak body” for higher education in Australia, and represents and lobbies for capitalist class interests in higher education.

It is therefore not surprising that it has developed this particular definition, given its strong bilateral relations with Israeli higher education, including signing a 2013 memorandum of understanding with Association of University Heads, Israel.

It should be noted that the NTEU National Council last October called on UA to withdraw from this as part of its Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions resolution.

All university students and staff committed to anti-racism, academic freedom and freedom of speech should join the campaign against the UA definition.

Local NTEU branches and student groups are discussing and passing motions rejecting the new definition and NTEU for Palestine has called a National Day of Action for March 26 with that as one of its key demands.

We will not be silenced on Palestine.

Jonathan Strauss and Markela Panegyres are members of the National Tertiary Education Union and the Socialist Alliance. Republished from Green Left with permission.

Jewish Council slams Australian universities’ ‘dangerous, politicised’ antisemitism definition

APR editor — Wed, 26 Feb 2025 09:58:33 +0000

Asia Pacific Report

An independent Jewish body has condemned the move by Australia’s 39 universities to endorse a “dangerous and politicised” definition of antisemitism which threatens academic freedom.

The Jewish Council of Australia, a diverse coalition of Jewish academics, lawyers, writers and teachers, said in a statement that the move would have a “chilling effect” on legitimate criticism of Israel, and risked institutionalising anti-Palestinian racism.

The council also criticised the fact that the universities had done so “without meaningful consultation” with Palestinian groups or diverse Jewish groups which were critical of Israel.

The definition was developed by the Group of Eight (Go8) universities and adopted by Universities Australia.

“By categorising Palestinian political expression as inherently antisemitic, it will be unworkable and unenforceable, and stifle critical political debate, which is at the heart of any democratic society,” the Jewish Council of Australia said.

“The definition dangerously conflates Jewish identities with support for the state of Israel and the political ideology of Zionism.”

The council statement said that it highlighted two key concerns:

Mischaracterisation of criticism of Israel
The definition states: “Criticism of Israel can be antisemitic when it is grounded in harmful tropes, stereotypes or assumptions and when it calls for the elimination of the State of Israel or all Jews or when it holds Jewish individuals or communities responsible for Israel’s actions.”

The definition’s inclusion of “calls for the elimination of the State of Israel” would mean, for instance, that calls for a single binational democratic state, where Palestinians and Israelis had equal rights, could be labelled antisemitic.

Moreover, the wording around “harmful tropes” was dangerously vague, failing to distinguish between tropes about Jewish people, which were antisemitic, and criticism of the state of Israel, which was not, the statement said.

Misrepresentation of Zionism as core to Jewish identity
The definition states that for most Jewish people “Zionism is a core part of their Jewish identity”.

The council said it was deeply concerned that by adopting this definition, universities would be taking and promoting a view that a national political ideology was a core part of Judaism.

“This is not only inaccurate, but is also dangerous,” said the statement.

“Zionism is a political ideology of Jewish nationalism, not an intrinsic part of Jewish identity.

“There is a long history of Jewish opposition to Zionism, from the beginning of its emergence in the late-19th century, to the present day. Many, if not the majority, of people who hold Zionist views today are not Jewish.”

In contrast to Zionism and the state of Israel, said the council, Jewish identities traced back more than 3000 years and spanned different cultures and traditions.

Jewish identities were a rightly protected category under all racial discrimination laws, whereas political ideologies such as Zionism and support for Israel were not, the council said.

Growing numbers of dissenting Jews
“While many Jewish people identify as Zionist, many do not. There are a growing number of Jewish people worldwide, including in Australia, who disagree with the actions of the state of Israel and do not support Zionism.

“Australian polling in this area is not definitive, but some polls suggest that 30 percent of Australian Jews do not identify as Zionists.

“A recent Canadian poll found half of Canadian Jews do not identify as Zionist. In the United States, more and more Jewish people are turning away from Zionist beliefs and support for the state of Israel.”

Sarah Schwartz, a human rights lawyer and the Jewish Council of Australia’s executive officer, said: “It degrades the very real fight against antisemitism for it to be weaponised to silence legitimate criticism of the Israeli state and Palestinian political expressions.

“It also risks fomenting division between communities and institutionalising anti-Palestinian racism.”

The full Jewish Council of Australia statement

NZ govt plans to make ‘heavy handed’ change to free speech rules for universities

APR editor — Sat, 21 Dec 2024 07:19:05 +0000

By John Gerritsen, RNZ News education correspondent

The New Zealand government coalition is tweaking university regulations to curb what it says is an increasingly “risk-averse approach” to free speech.

The proposed changes will set clear expectations on how universities should approach freedom of speech issues.

Each university will then have to adopt a “freedom of speech statement” consistent with the central government’s expectations.

READ MORE: Other academic freedom reports

The changes will also prohibit tertiary institutions from adopting positions on issues that do not relate to their core functions.

Associate Education Minister David Seymour said fostering students’ ability to debate ideas is an essential part of universities’ educational mission.

“Despite being required by the Education Act and the Bill of Rights Act to uphold academic freedom and freedom of expression, there is a growing trend of universities deplatforming speakers and cancelling events where they might be perceived as controversial or offensive,” he said.

“That’s why the National/ACT coalition agreement committed to introduce protections for academic freedom and freedom of speech to ensure universities perform their role as the critic and conscience of society.”

Minister for Tertiary Education and Skills Penny Simmonds said freedom of speech was fundamental to the concept of academic freedom.

“Universities should promote diversity of opinion and encourage students to explore new ideas and perspectives. This includes enabling them to hear from invited speakers with a range of viewpoints.”

It is expected the changes will take effect by the end of next year, after which universities will have six months to develop a statement and get it approved.

Aside from the fact that the free speech legislation for universities is a waste of time (and seemingly ideologically inconsistent with the anti-regulation stance of the government), this line from the RNZ article is both hilarious and worrying pic.twitter.com/aOoPa0ZPc5

— Quintin Jane (@RealQuintinJane) December 19, 2024

Te Herenga Waka-Victoria University of Wellington said the important issue of free speech had been a dominant topic throughout the year.

It believed a policy it had come up with would align with the intent of the criteria laid out by the government today.

However, the Greens are among critics, saying the government’s changes will add fuel to the political fires of disinformation, and put teachers and students in the firing line.

Labour says universities should be left to make decisions on free speech themselves.

‘A heavy-handed approach’
The Tertiary Education Union (TEU) said proposed rules could do more harm than good.

They have been been welcomed by the Free Speech Union, which said academic freedom was “under threat”, but the TEU said there was no problem to solve.

TEU president Sandra Grey said the move seemed to be aimed at ensuring people could spread disinformation on university campuses.

“I think one of the major concerns is that you might get universities opening up the space that is for academic and rigorous debate and saying it’s okay we can have climate deniers, we can have people who believe in creationism coming into our campuses and speaking about it as though it were scientific, as though it was rigorously defendable when in fact we know some of these questions . . . have been settled,” she said.

Grey said academics who expressed views on campus could expect them to be debated, but that was part and parcel of working at a university and not an attack on their freedom of speech.

“There isn’t actually a problem. I do think universities, all the staff who work there, the students, understand that they’re covered by all of their requirements for freedom of speech that other citizens are.

“So it feels like we’ve got a heavy-handed approach from a government that apparently is anti-regulation but is now going to put in place the whole lot of requirements on a community that just doesn’t need it.”

Some topics ‘suppressed’

Free Speech Union chief executive Jonathan Ayling . . . some academics are afraid to express their views and there is also a problem with “compelled speech”. Image: VNP/Phil Smith/RNZ News

Free Speech Union chief executive Jonathan Ayling said freedom of speech was under threat in universities.

“We’ve supported academics . . . where they feel that they have been unfairly disadvantaged simply for holding a different opinion to some of their peers. Of course, that is also an addition to the explicit calls for people to be cancelled, to be unemployed,” he said.

Ayling said some academics were afraid to express their views and there was also a problem with “compelled speech”.

“Forcing certain references on particularly ideological issues. There’s questions around race, gender, international conflicts, covid-19, these are all questions that we’ve found have been suppressed and also there’s the aspect of self-censorship,” he said.

“As we have and alongside partners looked into this more and more, it seems that many people in the academy exist in a culture of fear.”

University committed to differing viewpoints
Te Herenga Waka-Victoria University of Wellington is committed to hearing a range of different viewpoints on its campuses, vice-chancellor Professor Nic Smith says.

Free speech had been an important issue during 2024, and the university had arrived at a policy that covered both freedom of speech and academic freedom.

By consulting widely, there was now a shared understanding of “foundational principles”, and its policy would be in place early in the new year.

“We believe this policy aligns with the intent of the criteria [from the government] as we understand them. It recognises the strength of our diverse university community and affirms that this diversity makes us stronger,” Professor Smith said.

“At the same time, it acknowledges that within any diverse community, individuals will inevitably encounter ideas they disagree with-sometimes strongly.

“Finding value in these disagreements is something universities are very good at: listening to different points of view in the spirit of advancing understanding and learning that can ultimately help us live and work better together.”

The university believed in hearing a range of views from staff, rather than adopting a single institutional position.

“The only exception to this principle is on matters that directly affect our core functions as a university.”

‘Stoking fear and division’

The Green Party’s spokesperson for Tertiary Education, Francisco Hernadez . . . this new policy has nothing to do with free speech. Image: VNP/Phil Smith/RNZ News

Green Party’s spokesperson for Tertiary Education, Francisco Hernadez, said the new policy had nothing to do with free speech.

“This is about polluting our public discourse for political gain.”

Universities played a critical role, providing a platform for informed and reasoned debate.

“Our universities should be able to decide who is given a platform on their campuses, not David Seymour. These changes risk turning our universities into hostile environments unsafe for marginalised communities.

“Misinformation, disinformation, and rhetoric that inflames hatred towards certain groups has no place in our society, let alone our universities. Freedom of speech is fundamental, but it is not a licence to harm.”

Hernandez said universities should be trusted to ensure the balance was struck between academic freedom and a duty of care.

“Today’s announcement has also come with a high dose of unintended irony.

“David Seymour is speaking out of both sides of his mouth by on the one hand claiming to support freedom of speech, but on the other looking to limit the ability universities have to take stances on issues, like the war in Gaza for example.

“This is an Orwellian attempt to limit discourse to the confines of the government’s agenda. This is about stoking fear and division for political gain.”

Labour’s Associate Education (Tertiary) spokesperson Deborah Russell responded: “One of the core legislated functions of universities in this country is to be a critic and conscience of society. That means continuing to speak truth to power, even if those in power don’t like it.”

“Nowhere should be a platform for hate speech. I am certain universities can make these decisions themselves.”

‘Expectations clarified’ – university
The University of Auckland said in a statement the announcement of planned legislation changes would help “to clarify government expectations in this area”.

“The university has a longstanding commitment to maintaining freedom of expression and academic freedom on our campuses, and in recent years has worked closely with [the university’s] senate and council to review, revise and consult on an updated Freedom of Expression and Academic Freedom Policy.

“This is expected to return to senate and council for further discussion in early 2025 and will take into account the proposed new legislation.”

The university described the nature of the work as “complex”.

“While New Zealand universities have obligations under law to protect freedom of expression, academic freedom and their role as ‘critic and conscience of society’, as the proposed legislation appreciates, this is balanced against other important policies and codes.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

West and media are ‘erasing’ Palestinian history, say critics

APR editor — Thu, 19 Dec 2024 07:00:16 +0000

Asia Pacific Report

Palestinian history is “deliberately ignored” and is being effectively “erased” as part of Western news media narratives, while establishment forces work to shut down anyone speaking out against Israel’s slaughter in Gaza, academics have told a university conference of legal and Middle East experts.

A two-day online summit Erasure and Defiance: the Politics of Silence and Voice on Palestine, hosted by the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) Diversities and Social Inclusion Research Centre, also heard the type of reporting in the mainstream media “normalised violence” against Palestinians, reports the UTS Central News.

Also, the murder of Palestinians and resistance by them had been routinely mischaracterised as “loss and failure” on their part as though it was their own fault.

Although the conference took place over one and-a-half days in July and brought together Arab, Muslim, Jewish and Indigenous speakers from Palestine, Australia, Germany, Japan, the United States and the United Kingdom, details have only just been released.

The release of the conference proceedings comes more than one year on from the start of the Israeli War on Gaza, now extended into Lebanon, Syria and Yemen, with arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, and an Amnesty International investigation concluding Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

The western media has ranged from selective reporting of facts… and publishing outright lies that justify the murder of Palestinians.

According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) at least 45,097 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, including over 17,492 children, with more than 107,244 people injured and in excess of 10,000 people missing under the rubble of collapsed buildings.

Israeli forces, meanwhile, have killed journalists at a faster rate than any conflict on record, with estimates varying between 137, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, 188 documented by Turkish news agency Anadolu Ajansi, and the 196 killed as reported by the Gaza Government Media Office.

By comparison 63 journalists were killed in 20 years of the Vietnam War.

Posed war crime questions
The conference posed major questions regarding the erasing of Palestinian history, how it enables present-day war crimes and how defiance has resonated and inspired ongoing resistance by:

Palestinians fighting to defend their lives and their land, or as seen around the world, in civic protests;
the BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement;
human rights advocacy;
alternative social media production; and
legal challenges in the highest of our international institutions, the ICC and the International Court of Justice.

The conference was officially opened with the Welcome to Country, from Uncle Greg Simms, Gadigal elder of the Dharug Nation.

Uncle Greg spoke about the importance of land and country to the survival of Australia’s Indigenous people, the role of ancestral ties and connections, the importance of history and allies in the face of genocide, and the need to empathise with the people of Palestine at this time.

Dr Janine Hourani’s address. Video: UTS

Janine Hourani from the University of Exeter and Palestinian Youth Movement, in her keynote speech detailed the history of Palestinian resistance to Zionist occupation, addressing how the recording of history, privileged by a select few, served to stifle narratives, as well as erase key figures and moments in time, “reproducing a particular version of Palestinian history that focuses on defeat and loss, rather than resistance and rebellion”.

“The Western media has ranged from selective reporting of facts, reporting Palestinians as ‘died’ and Israeli settlers as ‘murdered’ and publishing outright lies that justify the murder of Palestinians,” said Hourani.

“Since October we’ve heard multiple political interventions being made about the Western media’s complicity in the current genocide in Palestine.”

Souheir Edalbi, a law lecturer at Western Sydney University, convened the session that followed, featuring four speakers.

Anti-Palestinian racism
Randa Abdelfattah, an author, lawyer and academic, addressed anti-Palestinian racism which serves to disarm criticism of Israel and Zionism.

Udi Raz, an academic and activist based in Germany, presented a case study of Mizrahi or Arab Jews in Germany, interrogating the definition of semitism and otherness in that context, the culturally pervasive racism towards Arabs, and German anxieties about what constitutes a non-European identity.

Annie Pfingst, an author and academic, listed 11 different types of “erasure” by Israel, from the confiscation, possession and renaming of Palestinian villages through to the holding of Palestinian bodies killed by the Israeli forces, not returned to their families, or buried in the “cemetery of numbers”.

She described a “necrological regime” that turns dead bodies into prisoners of the state, penalising and torturing the community, serving “to further evict the native in line with the structure of the settler colonial imperative of elimination”.

We have seen many instances of pro-Palestinian voices who have been sacked from their work places.

Jessica Holland, a researcher, curator and archivist, discussed how the history of archiving of Palestinian material is “deeply embedded within a legacy of coloniality”, and the importance of Palestinian social history and archiving projects, in redressing and countering hegemonic understandings and organisation of materials.

“Journalists, teachers, doctors, health care workers, public servants, lawyers, artists, food hospitality workers. Across every profession and industry [showing] solidarity with Palestine has been met with a repertoire of repressive tactics, disciplinary employment processes, cancelled contracts, lawfare, police brutality, parliamentary scrutiny, coordinated complaints and harassment campaigns, media coverage, doxxing, harassment, attempts at law reform and policy amendments,” said Abdelfattah.

“We have seen in the past few days the treatment of [Senator] Fatima Payman and the intimidation, bullying and silencing she has endured.

“We have also seen many instances of pro-Palestinian voices who have been sacked from their work places.”

On day two of the conference Aunty Glendra Stubbs gave the Acknowledgement of Country, which was followed by the keynote speaker Jeff Halper, anthropologist, author, lecturer, political activist and director of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions.

Normalising violence
Halper addressed how Israel as a Zionist settler colonial state normalises violence, erasure and apartheid against Palestinians, where physical and cultural genocide are built in, necessitating indigenous resistance.

A second panel, “Social Movements, in Defiance”, convened by Alison Harwood, a social change practitioner, included speakers Nasser Mashni from the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN), Sarah Schwartz from the Jewish Council of Australia, and Latoya Rule from UTS Jumbunna Institute for Indigenous Education and Research.

Speakers shared insights on how social movements mobilise from within their diverse communities, to reach and potentially impact the Australian and international social and political stage.

Interdisciplinary storyteller and media producer Daz Chandler presented a series of pre-recorded interviews and a live discussion with participants involved in University campus encampments from around the world including activists from Birzeit University in the Occupied West Bank, Mexico, Trinity College in Dublin, UCLA, the University of Melbourne, University of Tokyo, University of Sydney and Monash University.

Two further sessions focused on responses “From the Field”, with a third panel convened by Paula Abboud, a cultural worker, educator, writer and creative producer, featuring The Age journalist Maher Moghrabi, author and human rights lawyer Sara Saleh, Lena Mozayani from NSW Teachers for Palestine, and Dr Sana Pathan from ANZ Doctors for Palestine.

Each reflected on their work and the challenges they encountered in their respective professional fields. Obstructions they faced ranged from hindering and silencing the expression of ideas, through to the prevention of carrying out critical on-the-ground work to save lives.

Hometown of Nablus
The final panel of the conference was moderated by Derek Halawa, a Palestinian living in the diaspora, who shared his experience of travelling to his hometown of Nablus.

He followed virtual footsteps from his cousin’s video, through the alley ways, to reach the home of his great grandfather, a journey which culminated in reaching the steps of Al Aqsa Mosque, with both spaces symbolising belonging and hope.

Cathy Peters, media worker and co-founder of BDS Australia described a diverse range of disruption movements calling for the end of ties with Israeli companies, since the war on Gaza.

This was followed by RIta Jabri Markwell, solicitor and adviser to the Australian Muslim Advocacy Network, addressing specific points of Australian law dealing with terrorism, freedom of speech, and racial discrimination.

The conference, which was was co-convened by Barbara Bloch, Wafa Chafic, James Goodman, Derek Halawa and Christina Ho, concluded with UTS Sociology Professor James Goodman giving an overview of the proceedings and potential actions post-conference.

One post-conference outcome is an additional series of interviews produced by Daz Chandler exploring the power of creative practices utilised within the Palestinian resistance movement.

It features renowned Palestinian contemporary artist Khaled Hourani, Ben Rivers: co-founder of the Palestinian Freedom Bus, Yazan al-Saadi: co-founder of Cartoonists for Palestine, Taouba Yacoubi: Sew 4 Palestine, Birkbeck University of London; and artist and activist from Naarm Melbourne, Margaret Mayhew.

Republished from the UTS Central News.

‘Attack on freedom of speech’: USP staff call out Ahluwalia for sacking union president

APR editor — Fri, 19 Jul 2024 19:09:15 +0000

RNZ Pacific

The University of the South Pacific staff associations are up in arms about the sacking of a union leader and academic by the university’s chief executive.

In a joint press release, the Association of the University of the South Pacific (AUSPS) and the USP Staff Union (USPSU), this week claimed that USP vice-chancellor and president Pal Ahluwalia had “launched a vicious attack on the staff unions and freedom of speech” after he terminated the employment contract AUSPS president Dr Tamara Osborne-Naikatini on July 9.

They said Ahluwalia sacked Dr Osborne-Naikatini because she spoke to the media about the “flawed process” through which he was offered a renewal to his contract to lead the institution.

READ MORE: Other USP saga reports

“The university’s claim of ‘gross misconduct’ stems from information Dr Osborne-Naikatini allegedly shared, as AUSP President, in an Islands Business interview reported in the March 2024 edition that revealed a flawed process in the review of the performance of Ahluwalia that subsequently led to a two-year renewal of contract,” they said in the release.

Dr Osborne-Naikatini was the staff representative on the the chief academic authority — the USP Senate — to the review committee, they added.

“Dr Osborne-Naikatini stood for the staff of USP and fought for good governance which ultimately led to her termination,” they said.

The staff unions say that by sacking the biology lecturer, Ahluwalia has “launched a vicious attack on the staff unions and freedom of speech” and are demanding her reinstatement.

RNZ Pacific had put these claims to the university.

Staff contracts ‘confidential’
“Please note that all staff contracts, including terminations, are confidential. The university is not at liberty to discuss staff information with third parties,” the USP said in an email statement.

The USP, the premier institution of higher learning for the region, has had to deal with a series of crisis in relation to the good governance practices and staff-management issues since the vice-chancellor first took the job in 2018.

Professor Pal Ahluwalia . . . deported from Fiji in 2019, but based in Nauru then Samoa. Image: RNZ Pacific

In 2019, Ahluwalia was deported from Fiji in a midnight raid carried out Fijian police and immigration officials, after he fell out of favour with the previous Bainimarama administration, for exposing allegations of corruption and financial mismanagement at the university under the leadership of his predecessor.

He led USP from exile, for some time from Nauru, before relocating to Samoa in 2021. In May this year, the USP Council voted for him to relocate back to Suva.

The staff unions reminded Ahluwalia of the 2019 saga in their joint statement, saying they “stood steadfast with him when he was victimised as the whistleblower. He seemed to have a short-lived memory”.

Earlier this year, the unions were at loggerheads with the management over salary disputes.

They had threatened to take strike action if the executive team failed to meet their demands, which they claimed has been neglected by Ahluwalia.

However, both sides reached an agreement last month, and the unions withdrew their strike action.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Columbia Law Review website shut down over ‘censored’ article critical of Israel

Pacific Media Watch — Wed, 05 Jun 2024 08:38:28 +0000

Pacific Media Watch

The editorial board of the Columbia Law Review journal — made up of faculty and alumni from the university’s law school — shut down the review’s website on Monday after editors refused to halt publication of an academic article by a Palestinian human rights lawyer that was critical of Israel.

Al Jazeera reports that the student editors of the journal said they were pressured by the board to not publish the article which accused Israel of carrying out genocide in Gaza and implementing an apartheid regime against Palestinians.

The review’s website was taken down after the article was published on Monday morning and remained offline last night, reports AP news agency.

Columbia Law Review . . . “under maintenance”. Image: APR screenshot

A static homepage informed visitors the domain was “under maintenance”.

Several editors at the Columbia Law Review described the board’s intervention as an unprecedented breach of editorial independence at the periodical.

In a letter sent to student editors yesterday, the board of directors said it was concerned that the article, titled “Nakba as a Legal Concept,” had not gone through the “usual processes of review or selection for articles”.

However, the editor involved in soliciting and editing the aricle said they had followed a “rigorous review process”.

‘A microcosm of repression’
The author of the article, human rights lawyer Rabea Eghbariah, a Harvard doctoral candidate, said the suspension of the journal’s website should be seen as “a microcosm of a broader authoritarian repression taking place across US campuses”.

The Intercept reports that this was the second time in barely eight months that Eghbariah had been censored by US academic publications.

Columbia Law Review . . . second journal to censor Palestinian law scholar over Nakba truth. Image: APR screenshot

Last November, the Harvard Law Review made the unprecedented decision to “kill” (not publish) the author’s edited essay prior to publication. The author was due to be the first Palestinian legal scholar published in the quality journal.

As The Intercept reported at the time, “Eghbariah’s essay — an argument for establishing ‘Nakba’, the expulsion, dispossession, and oppression of Palestinians, as a formal legal concept that widens its scope — faced extraordinary editorial scrutiny and eventual censorship.”

“When the Harvard publication spiked his article, editors from another Ivy League law school reached out to Eghbariah.

“Students from the Columbia Law Review solicited a new article from the scholar and, upon receiving it, decided to edit it and prepare it for publication.

“Now, eight months into Israel’s onslaught against Gaza, Eghbariah’s work has once again been stifled.”

“Zionism and Nakba are mutually constitutive.”
-Rabea Eghbariah

This perspective unmasks Zionism’s euphemisms of “right to exist” & “safe homeland” to reveal its vile heart of racism & violence—the ongoing Nakba against the Palestinian People. https://t.co/6E4Oqohobk pic.twitter.com/pKsneYPIt2

— Eusocial Ape (@EusocialApe) June 5, 2024

Fiji government revokes travel ban on former head of University of Fiji

APR editor — Sun, 25 Feb 2024 10:43:30 +0000

By Kelvin Anthony, RNZ Pacific digital/social lead

A former Fiji university head who was banned from returning to the country by the previous Bainimarama government has had her ban revoked.

Professor Shushila Chang, a former vice-chancellor of University of Fiji (UoF) in a daring move had departed during the covid-19 lockdown in March 2020, breaching the border restriction order at the time, to be with her sick husband in Australia.

The Immigration Department subsequently declared her a prohibited immigrant and UoF sacked her for unauthorised departure.

READ MORE: Other Fiji education reports

She applied for a judicial review later that year but it was turned down by the High Court, which ruled the government’s decision could not be challenged through judicial review, as Fiji’s immigration law does not allow anyone to challenge the decision of a minister in any court.

However, Professor Chang said that she received a letter via email from the coalition government’s Immigration Minister Pio Tikoduaudua on January 22 informing her that she can now return to Fiji.

“The travel ban on Professor Chang has been revoked after a thorough review of her case,” Tikoduadua confirmed to RNZ Pacific on Friday.

“This decision aligns with our commitment to justice, transparency, and fairness.”

The minister said Professor Chang was a respected academic and former vice-chancellor of the UoF who could now return to Fiji.

Principles of natural justice
“This step reflects our government’s dedication to reassessing past actions to ensure they align with our values and principles of natural justice,” he said.

“We recognise the importance of academic freedom and the contributions individuals like Professor Chang can make to Fiji’s education and society.”

He said the Fiji government aims to foster an environment that encourages open dialogue and values the exchange of ideas, adding “lifting this ban demonstrates our commitment to these ideals.”

Immigration Minister Pio Tikoduadua . . . “We recognise the importance of academic freedom and the contributions individuals like Professor Chang can make.” Image: Fiji govt/FB

Chang, who was in the United States when she received the news, is now looking forward to visiting Fiji and reconnecting with friends.

She said her partner and children, who were “very concerned and supportive”, were also “happy and relieved” that her travel ban has been lifted.

“[My husband] was having severe mobility problems in Fiji such as losing his balance and headaches. Upon our return to Australia, the oncologist discovered he was suffering from lung cancer which had spread to the brain.

“It is fortunate we returned immediately and sought treatment. We are thankful he was able to receive treatment and is well.”

Invited back
Professor Chang said apart from prioritising her husband’s wellbeing to aid in his recovery, she had also been meeting and consulting with universities such as the University of Bordeaux (France) and Coventry (United Kingdom), and delivering training programmes.

She confirmed she was appointed as an academic advisor to Pacific Polytech — a private technical and vocational education and training (TVET) provider in Fiji.

She said it was “an exciting role as Pacific Polytech has a visionary mandate”.

“I have been invited to present a public lecture by Pacific Polytech on a globally accredited National Inspection and Testing Laboratory in Fiji.

“The intent is to improve the safety, quality and sustainability of all products from Fiji including water, food, soil, air, furniture, cement, food, wood and others.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

NZ universities are not normal Crown institutions – they shouldn’t be ‘Tiriti-led’

APR editor — Sun, 02 Apr 2023 23:38:55 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Dominic O’Sullivan, Charles Sturt University

As part of its aspiration to be “Tiriti-led”, the University of Otago has embarked on a consultation process to re-brand. The proposed change involves a new logo and a new, deeply symbolic Māori name: Ōtākou Whakaihu Waka.

Universities occasionally change logos, names and marketing strategies. All New Zealand institutions have added te reo Māori to their original titles, often opting for a literal translation — “Te Whare Wānanga” — to describe their status as a university. But Otago is taking it a step further.

Metaphorically, “whakaihu” refers to the university’s place as the country’s oldest university, as well as its Māori students often being the first to graduate from their whanau and communities. And it symbolically includes everyone on the “waka”.

That is exactly what a university is supposed to be, of course — a place for everyone. A place where people are free to think and develop ideas, even contested or unpopular ones.

As the Education and Training Act 2020 says, universities must operate as the “critic and conscience of society”.

But being “Tiriti-led” is not as straightforward. It throws into sharp relief where universities sit in relation to the Crown under te Tiriti o Waitangi/Treaty of Waitangi. This, in turn, raises quite fundamental questions about what a university is in the first place.

The University has collaborated with mana whenua to create a proposed new visual identity including a new Māori name and tohu (symbol), to sit along the official University of Otago name, which we believe represent where we have come from and where we’re going. pic.twitter.com/mZ86NPOzE2

— University of Otago (@otago) March 15, 2023

What is te Tiriti, what is a university?
Essentially, te Tiriti o Waitangi was the Māori language agreement in 1840 between Māori hapu and the British Crown which set out the terms of British settlement. Britain could establish government over its own people, hapu would retain authority over their own affairs.

Māori would enjoy the “rights and privileges” of British subjects, a legal status which continues to evolve as New Zealand citizenship. The Treaty of Waitangi is an English language version of the agreement with different and less favourable emphases for Māori.

By wanting to become “Tiriti-led”, Otago has decided it is part of the Crown party to this agreement. This makes Kai Tahu, as mana whenua (people of the land), the university’s “principal Tiriti partner”.

By contrast, when Massey University says it’s Tiriti-led, it doesn’t explicitly say it’s part of the Crown. Auckland University of Technology’s vice-chancellor has said his university is Tiriti-led, but there’s no definition to be easily found on the public record.

Styling a relationship in this way is significant — but not necessarily in ways that keep faith with te Tiriti o Waitangi, or with the essential purposes of a university.

Universities are owned and principally funded by the Crown. But their obligation to independent scholarship means they cannot be part of the Crown in the same way as a government department.

Universities don not take direction from ministers in the same way, and their staff are not public servants. They are not part of the executive branch of government.

Together with their students and graduates, academics are the university — a community of scholars obliged to contribute to the discovery and sharing of knowledge, but not obliged to serve the government of the day.

In the same waka but on different sides of the partnership: Prime Minister Chris Hipkins at Waitangi this year. Image: Getty Images

Us and them
Parliament and the executive (government ministers) together decide what te Tiriti means to the Crown side of the relationship. Public servants offer advice, but ultimately take ministers’ instructions on giving effect to whatever is the Crown’s Tiriti policy.

Academics, however, can take a different view. They are not bound by what the Crown side of the agreement thinks. And, as developments in te Tiriti policy show, academic independence makes a difference.

In 1877, New Zealand’s Supreme Court found the Treaty was legally a “simple nullity” because it had not been incorporated into domestic law. It wasn’t the public servant’s role to object, at least not in public. That kind of intellectual freedom belongs elsewhere. Explicitly, it’s one of the reasons universities exist.

Academics — Māori and others — have contributed significantly to developments in te Tiriti policy since 1877, especially in more recent years. Their contributions have often contested prevailing political thought. Universities have given Māori academics — and through them, Māori communities — the kind of voice unavailable to public servants working for the Crown partner.

Partnership is one of the “Treaty principles”, developed legally and politically as an interpretive guide to the agreement. But partnership creates a “them” and “us” binary.

In my book, Sharing the Sovereign: recognition, treaties and the state, I show how this binary encourages people to think of the Crown as exclusively Pākehā. Any institution that is not solely Māori is an institution that belongs to “them”.

This reinforces Māori separation from the university as an institution that should belong to all of us — and to each of us in our own ways.

Academics are not public servants
If an institution represents one side of a partnership, that institution cannot be a “place for everyone”. A Māori student or staff member should be able to say, “I belong here as much as anybody else, with the same rights, opportunities and obligations to contribute to the institution’s culture, values and purpose.”

That includes the right to study and teach te Tiriti with an independence that is not available to public servants.

In 2020, I helped develop “Critical Tiriti Analysis”, a policy evaluation method that could be used to assess public policy consistency with te Tiriti. While anecdotally it seems now to be widely used across the public service, it’s not something likely to have been written by a public servant.

The Crown is a cautious Tiriti partner.

Thoroughness and objectivity — but not political caution — guide academic contributions to policy debate. Such contributions are different in style and purpose from the kind of policy making that it is the duty of the public service to undertake.

Universities are not the Crown in the same sense, and this is why they are not Tiriti partners.

Dr Dominic O’Sullivan, Adjunct Professor, Faculty of Health and Environmental Sciences, Auckland University of Technology, and Professor of Political Science, Charles Sturt University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

New Zealand doesn’t offer tenure to academics, but the AUT employment dispute shows it’s more than a job perk

APR editor — Fri, 13 Jan 2023 03:33:02 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Jack Heinemann, University of Canterbury

Late last year, the Auckland University of Technology (AUT) initiated a process to eliminate 170 academic jobs to cut costs. The Employment Relations Authority (ERA) found AUT’s approach breached its collective employment agreement with staff and their union and ordered it to withdraw the termination notices.

Tertiary education runs on an insecure labour force in New Zealand and elsewhere. The AUT decision illustrates that even traditionally secure positions are becoming less so.

Tenure is the traditional protection for academics in the tertiary sector, but New Zealand does not have tenure at its universities.

Tenure is more than a perk

A common argument against tenure is that it leads to a complacent, under-motivated university professor. These concerns are hypothetical — evidence that tenure causes productivity differences is lacking.

In fact, one of few large studies on the subject found the opposite. Good administrators should be able to manage any actual productivity issues as they do in all other workplaces.

On the other hand, lack of tenure creates risks for free societies. Tenure is common practice in other liberal democracies. UNESCO says:

Security of employment in the profession, including tenure […] should be safeguarded as it is essential to the interests of higher education.

Tenure is important, if not indispensable, for academic freedom. Academic freedom is essential to a university’s mission, and this mission is a characteristic of a democracy. As University of Regina professor Marc Spooner put it:

A country’s institutional commitment to academic freedom is a key indicator of whether its democracy is in good health.

The Employment Relations Authority has issued a compliance order to the university, requiring it to withdraw its notices of termination. https://t.co/NUvBfqS6ad

— Stuff (@NZStuff) January 5, 2023

Scholarship is not piecework
The ERA said AUT misunderstood terminology in the collective employment agreement.
The clash term was “specific position”. AUT’s position was that specific positions are identified by professional ranks (from lecturer to professor) and the numbers of each role across four particular faculties.

The ERA did not agree and concluded an essential component for identifying specific positions is the employee, being the person who is the current position holder or appointee to a position.

AUT’s assertion would be like the air force using the rank of “captain” to adjust its number of pilots. The number of captains does not tell you what each captain does, be it to fly planes or fix them.

Without tenure, a standard less than this minimum established by the ERA can be used to eliminate academics who have legitimate priorities that do not align with the administrative staff of the day, or are the victims of any other concealed discrimination. The ERA clarification makes it more difficult to inhibit intramural criticism, the right to criticise the actions taken by managers and leaders of the university.

The authoritative review of freedom of speech and academic freedom in Australian universities singles out the importance of academic freedom for this purpose, saying:

It […] reflects the distinctive relationship of academic staff and universities, a relationship not able to be defined by reference to the ordinary law of employer and employee relationships.

The ERA clarification helps to prevent the firing of academics who are teaching, researching or questioning things administrators, funders or governments don’t want them to. But it is a finger in a leaking dyke. Tenure is a tried and tested general solution.

Health of the democracy
We only need to observe the events in the United States to recognise the importance of tenure. This benchmark country has a proud tradition of tenure. Nevertheless state governments are dismantling tenure to impose political control on curriculums. Our liberal democracy is not immune to this.

We need more than tenure-secured academic freedom to enable universities to do the sometimes dreary and at other times risky work of providing societies alternatives to populist, nationalist or autocratic movements. But as the Douglas Dillon chair in governance studies at the Brookings Institution, Darrell M. West, wrote, academic freedom is a problem for these movements.

Recognizing the moral authority of independent experts, when despots come to power, one of the first things they do is discredit authoritative institutions who hold leaders accountable and encourage an informed citizenry.

In a system with tenure, a university would have a defined stand-down period preventing reappointment to vacated positions. For example, if an academic program and associated tenured staff that teach it were eliminated at the University of Arkansas for financial reasons, the program could not be reactivated for at least five years. The stand-down inhibits whimsical or agenda-fuelled restructuring as a lazy option to manage staff.

If a similar trade-off were to be applied to how AUT defined specific positions, then no academics could be hired there for five years. It is very different to be prevented from hiring academics than it is to, say, not re-establishing a financially struggling department or program.

Herein lies the true value of tenure. It is greater than a protection of the individual. It protects society from wasteful or ideologically motivated restructuring as an alternative to poor management. Tenure is security of the public trust in our universities.

Dr Jack Heinemann is professor of molecular biology and genetics, University of Canterbury. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Fiji plans to ‘restore confidence’ in USP partnership, says Professor Prasad

APR editor — Tue, 03 Jan 2023 09:17:24 +0000

By Rakesh Kumar in Suva

Fiji’s Minister of Finance and deputy Prime Minister Professor Biman Prasad says all coalition partners in the new government have agreed to a closer relationship with the Suva-based regional University of the South Pacific (USP).

He said government would restore confidence in USP and respect the governance structure of the institution.

Professor Biman Prasad said that it was a commitment made by all coalition partners in government.

He said Fiji would now be “a real partner” with USP.

“We’re going to restore that confidence, we’re going to respect the governance structure of the university,” he said.

“This means that when the university council makes a decision, we as members in that council will respect that decision, unlike the previous government and their reps, who disregarded it because they didn’t win in the council.

“Things didn’t go in their favour; they tried to [withhold] the grant of the university through some bogus claim that there should be more investigation.

“None of that was true, none of that was reasonable.”

Vice-chancellor ban already lifted
He said the ban on vice-chancellor Professor Pal Ahluwalia, who was forced to become based at USP’s Samoa campus after being deported from Fiji in 2021, had already been lifted.

“As you know, the Prime Minister has already lifted the ban on Professor Pal Ahluwalia who was deported in the middle of the night,” he said.

“That was a sad thing for this country — it was an attack on democracy, it was an attack on academic freedom.

“So we are very pleased that our government has been able to remove that and we look forward to a very cooperative relationship with the University of the South Pacific and indeed with all other universities in the country because we believe that empowering the universities, giving them academic freedom, giving them autonomy is good for our students, good for our staff, good for the country.”

Professor Prasad said the government would work closely with tertiary institutions in the country.

“This government is going to work closely with the universities and other tertiary institutions to make sure that we empower them, we use resources at those universities to help government to work in policy areas, analyse data.

“As a government, we are going to be very, very liberal with the academic community in this country because we want them to know that this is a government which is going to be open, which is going to help them do research because we will not be afraid of critical research being done by academics, whether they are in Fiji or from outside.

“They will have access to data wherever possible. They will have access to the processes and the support to do research in critical areas.

“That will be very, very important for the government.”

#Fiji plans to ‘restore confidence’ in USP partnership, says Professor Prasad #AsiaPacificReport @fijitimes @bimanprasad #FijiPol #education #academicfreedom @USPlibrary @pal_vcp @ShailendraBSing @USPWansolwara @shrek45 https://t.co/MHM0kTlr2k pic.twitter.com/tXybbQwXkz

— David Robie (@DavidRobie) January 3, 2023

Half century of innovation
Pacific Media Watch reports that the University of the South Pacific is one of only two regional multinational universities in the world — the other is in the West Indies.

USP is jointly owned and governed by 12 member countries — Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Niue, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.

The university has campuses in all member countries with Fiji having three campuses.

For more than a half century, USP has been leading the Pacific with distinctive contributions in research, innovation, learning, teaching and community engagement.

Rakesh Kumar is a Fiji Times reporter. Republished with permission.

Fiji’s Finance Minister Professor Biman Prasad . . . ready to be interviewed outside Government Buildings. Image: Jona Konataci/The Fiji Times

Professor thrilled over USP return – Fiji to pay $90m university debt

APR editor — Mon, 26 Dec 2022 23:13:55 +0000

By Felix Chaudhary in Suva

Exiled University of the South Pacific vice-chancellor Professor Pal Ahluwalia says he is thrilled at the prospect of returning to Fiji.

Speaking to The Fiji Times from Los Angeles in the United States yesterday, he said Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka — when he was in opposition — made a commitment to pay Fiji’s outstanding debt of $90 million to USP and to allow him to return to Fiji.

“Mr Rabuka said it, National Federation Party leader Professor Biman Prasad said it, and the Social Democratic Liberal Party leader also said it,” Professor Ahluwalia said.

“So it’s part of all three parties’ manifestos and part of their public statements, so we as a university are delighted that this amount that has been outstanding for so long will finally come to the university.

“It’s excellent news, not just for the Fijian students but for the entire region because the region has been carrying Fijian students for quite a while and there will now be a chance for us to do a lot of things that we have deferred and not been able to do, particularly issues around maintenance.

“It also means we can now aggressively look for quality academic staff.”

Rabuka issued a statement on Boxing Day saying the prohibition order against Professor Ahluwalia had been lifted and he was welcome to travel to Fiji at any time.

Professor Ahluwalia and his wife Sandra Price claimed that on Wednesday February 3, 2021, 15 people made up of immigration officials and police stormed into their USP home and forcefully removed them at about 11.30pm.

They claimed they were driven the same night to Nadi International Airport and deported on the morning of Thursday, February 4, to Australia.

The FijiFirst government on February 4, 2022 issued a statement that the Immigration Department had ordered Professor Aluwahlia and his partner Sandra Price to leave Fiji with immediate effect following alleged “continuous breaches” by both individuals of Section 13 of the Immigration Act.

Government said under Section 13 of the Immigration Act 2003, no foreigner was permitted to conduct themselves in a manner prejudicial to the peace, defence, public safety, public order, public morality, public health, security, or good government of Fiji.

Fiji now ‘free country’
RNZ Pacific reports that Finance Minister Professor Biman Prasad said all three parties in the coalition had promised this in their election campaigns and manifestos.

The former FijiFirst government have withheld the payments since 2019 over a protracted battle with Professor Ahluwalia, now operating in exile out of Samoa.

“They didn’t like a man who was doing the right thing who exposed corruption within the university,” Professor Prasad said.

“And it has done you know, to some extent, terrible damage not only to the university, but also the unity in the whole region.”

In July, the two unions representing staff at the university said the Fiji government owes the institution F$78.4 million and the debt has increased since then.

“Well, I can’t tell you the timetable, but all I can say is…that the university will receive the appropriate funding, as well as the government will pay what is due as a result of the previous government withholding the grant to the university,” Professor Prasad said.

His revelation comes after the government statement by Prime Minister Rabuka inviting Professor Ahluwalia to return to Fiji.

Personal apology
Rabuka said he wanted to apologise to Professor Ahluwalia in person upon his arrival for the way he had been treated by Fiji.

The prime minister has also invited the widow of exiled Fijian academic, Professor Brij Lal, who passed away on Christmas Day last year to bring home his ashes for burial at Tabia near Labasa.

Professor Prasad said they look forward to welcoming home more Fijians and expatriates exiled during Voreqe Bainimarama’s 16-year-reign.

“Fiji is now a free country. We will welcome everyone who wants to come to Fiji. No one should fear about any kind of vindictiveness or harassment,” Professor Prasad said.

“That is what we promised during our campaign, and that is what this government will deliver.”

Felix Chaudhary is a Fiji Times reporter. Republished with Fiji Times permission. This article is also republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Professor thrilled over #USP return – #Fiji to pay $90m #university debt #AsiaPacificReport @fijitimes #rnzpacific @pal_vcp @ShailendraBSing @wansolwara @USPWansolwara @GeraldP87 #Fijipol #education #SitiveniRabuka @bimanprasad https://t.co/bC0ECuzF7d pic.twitter.com/laTlgEH3bf

— David Robie (@DavidRobie) December 26, 2022

Indonesia accused of using new Criminal Code to ‘colonise its own people’

APR editor — Fri, 09 Dec 2022 12:00:55 +0000

Asia Pacific Report

Civil society organisations which make up the National Alliance for Criminal Code Reform have slammed the decision by the Indonesian government and the House of Representatives (DPR) to ratify the Draft Criminal Code (RKUHP) which is seen as still containing a number of controversial articles, reports CNN Indonesia.

Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation (YLBHI) chairperson Muhammad Isnur criticised the DPR and the government because the enactment of the law was rushed and did not involve public participation.

According to Isnur, a number of articles in the RKUHP will take Indonesian society into a period of being “colonised” by its own government.

“Indeed the latest version of this draft regulation was only published on November 30, 2022, and still contained a series of problematic articles which have been opposed by the public because it will carry Indonesian society into an era of being colonised by its own government,” said Isnur in a statement.

The Civil Coalition, as conveyed by Isnur, has highlighted a number of articles in the RKUHP which are anti-democratic, perpetuate corruption, silence press freedom, obstruct academic freedom and regulate the public’s private lives.

According to Isnur, these articles will only be “sharp below but blunt above”, meaning they will come down hard on the poor but go easy on the rich, and it would make it difficult to prosecute crimes committed by corporations against the people.

“Once again this will be a regulation which is sharp below, blunt above, because it will be difficult to prosecute criminal corporations that violate the rights of communities and workers,” he said.

Criminalised over ideas
The Coalition for example highlighted Article 188 which criminalises anyone who spreads communist, Marxist or Leninist ideas, or other ideas which conflict with the state ideology of Pancasila.

According to Isnur, the article is ambiguous because it does not contain an explanation on who has the authority to determine if an idea conflicts with Pancasila.

According to Isnur, Article 188 has the potential to criminalise anyone, particularly government opponents, because it does not contain an explanation about which ideas conflict with Pancasila.

“This is a rubber [catchall] article and could revive the concept of crimes of subversion as occurred in the New Order era [of former president Suharto],” he said.

Then there are Articles 240 and 241 on insulting the government and state institutions.

He believes that these articles also have the potential to be “rubber” articles because they do not provide a definition of an insult. He is also concerned that the articles will be used to silence criticism against the government or state institutions.

The Coalition believes that there are still at least 14 problematic articles in the RKUHP. Aside from the spreading of communist ideas and insulting state institutions, there are several other articles such as those on morality, cohabitation and criminalising parades and protest actions.

Law ‘confusing’
The DPR earlier passed the RKUHP into law during a plenary meeting. A number of parties believe that the new law is confusing and contains problematic articles. These include the articles on insulting the president, makar (treason, subversion, rebellion), insulting state institutions, adultery and cohabitation and “fake news”.

Justice and Human Rights Minister Yasonna H. Laoly has invited members of the public to challenge the law in the Constitutional Court if they feel that there are articles that conflict with the constitution.

“So we must go through constitutional mechanisms, right. So we’re more civilised, be better at obeying the constitution, the law. So if it’s ratified into law the most correct mechanism is a judicial review,” said Laoly earlier.

Deputy Justice and Prosperity Minister Edward Omar Sharif Hiariej, meanwhile, is asking those who consider the law to be problematic or rushed to come and debate the issue with the ministry.

“You try answering yourself, yeah, is 59 years rushed? If it is said that many oppose it, how many? What is the substance? Come and debate it with us, we’re ready and we are truly convinced that if its tested it will be rejected,” said Hiariej.

Translated by James Balowski for IndoLeft News. The original title of the article was YLBHI Kecam Pengesahan RKUHP: Masyarakat Dijajah Pemerintah Sendiri. Republished with permission.

AUT VC Damon Salesa responds over 170 academic staff cuts

Pacific Media Watch — Tue, 06 Dec 2022 21:02:26 +0000

Pacific Media Watch

Yesterday RNZ’s Nine to Noon programme looked at the impact of redundancies at Auckland University of Technology (AUT) among academic staff — particularly on post-graduate students who are losing their supervisors.

The university has announced that 170 academic positions are being cut, but there are concerns about whether the criteria by which staff were selected to lose their jobs was fair.

Legal proceedings have been launched by the Tertiary Education Union (TEU), which says the university has truncated the processes for dismissal set out in the collective agreement.

It argues staff were selected because they failed to meet teaching and research requirements they did not know they were subject to.

Presenter Kathryn Ryan spoke to Professor Damon Salesa, who is vice-chancellor of AUT.

Pacific Media Watch reports that Professor Salesa, who is the first Pasifika vice-chancellor at a university in Aotearoa New Zealand, has also faced criticism from Māori and Pacific staff worried about their futures. Yesterday on RNZ TEU organiser Jill Jones outlined how Dr Salesa had declined to face academic staff over the cuts and refused to negotiate with the union.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Fiji academic warns over media ‘climate injustice’ in open access webinar

Pacific Media Watch — Wed, 26 Oct 2022 10:31:16 +0000

By David Robie

A Fiji-based academic challenged the Pacific region’s media and policymakers today over climate crisis coverage, asking whether the discriminatory style of reporting was a case of climate injustice.

Associate Professor Shailendra Singh, head of the journalism programme at the University of the South Pacific, said climate press conferences and meetings were too focused on providing coverage of “privileged elite viewpoints”.

“Elites have their say, but communities facing the brunt of climate change have their voices muted,” he told the Look at the Evidence: Climate Journalism and Open Science webinar panel exploring the role of journalism in raising climate awareness in the week-long Open Access Australasia virtual conference.

Dr Singh, who is also on the editorial board of Pacific Journalism Review and was speaking for the recently formed Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN), threw open several questions to the participants about what appeared to be “discriminatory reporting”.

“Is slanted media coverage marginalising grassroots voices? Is this a form of climate injustice?” he asked.

“Are news media unknowingly perpetuating climate injustice?”

He cited many of the hurdles impacting on the ability of Pacific news media to cover the climate crisis effectively, such as lack of resources in small media organisations and lack of reporting expertise.

‘Jack-of-all-trades’
“We are unable to have specialist climate reporters as in some other countries; our journalists tend to be a jack-of-all-trades, and master of none,” he said.

He did not mean this in a “disparaging manner”, saying “it’s just our reality” given limited resources.

Key Pacific media handicaps included:

• The smallness of Pacific media systems;
• Limited revenue and small profit margins;
• A high attrition rate among journalists (mostly due to uncompetitive salaries);
• Pacific journalists “don’t have the luxury” of specialising in one area; and
• No media economies of scale.

“Our journalists don’t build sufficient knowledge in any one topic for consistent or in-depth reporting,” he said. “And this is more deeply felt in areas such as climate reporting.”

He cited pioneering research on Pacific climate reporting by Samoan climate change journalist Lagipoiva Dr Cherelle Jackson, saying such Pacific media research was “scarce”.

‘Staying afloat in Paradise’
A research fellow with the Reuters Institute and Oxford University, Dr Jackson carried out research on how media in her homeland and six other Pacific countries were covering climate change. The 2010 report was titled Staying Afloat in Paradise: Reporting Climate Change in the Pacific.

Pacific journalists and editors “have a responsibility to inform readers on how climatic changes can affect them, she argued. But this did not translate into the pages of their newspapers.

“Climate change is simply not as high a priority for Pacific newsrooms as issues such as health, education and politics which all take precedence over even general environment reporting,” Dr Jackson wrote.

“For a region mainly classified by the United Nations as ‘least developed’ and ‘developing’ countries, it is apparent that there are more pressing issues than climate change.

“But the fact that the islands of the Pacific are already at the bottom end of the scale in regards to wealth and infrastructure, and the fact that climate change is also threatening the mere existence of some islands, should make it a big story. But it isn’t.”

She has continued her advocacy work on climate change as climate editor of the Associated Press and completing a doctorate on the topic.

Newsroom’s Marc Daalder . . . “we need this [open access] to happen for climate reporting”. Image: Open Access Week 2022 screenshot APR

The Open Access Australasia media panel today also included Newsroom’s Marc Daalder, The Conversation’s New Zealand science editor Veronica Meduna, and Guardian columnist Dr Jeff Sparrow of the University of Melbourne. It was chaired by Open Access Australasia deputy chair Dimity Flanagan.

Critical of paywalls
Daalder spoke about how open access to scientific papers was vitally important for journalists who needed to read complete papers, not just abstracts. He was critical of the paywalls on many scientific research papers.

Open access enabled journalists to do their job better and this was clearly shown during the covid-19 pandemic — “and we need this to happen for climate reporting”.

Meduna said it took far too long for research, such as on climate change, to filter through into public debate. Open access helped to reduce that gap.

She also said the success of The Conversation model showed that there was a growing demand for scientists communicating directly with the public with the help of journalists.

Dr Sparrow called for a social movement for meaningful action on the climate crisis and more scientific literacy was needed to enable this.

Highly critical of the “dysfunctional” academic publishing industry, he said open access would contribute to “radically accessible” science for the public.

The panel was organised by Tuwhera digital and open access publishing team at Auckland University of Technology.

Other webinars in the Open Access Week that ends on Friday.

Open Access Week 2022 … the media climate webinar panel. Image: Open Access Week screenshot APR

Australia and New Zealand’s ‘deafening silence’ on Pacific democracy and human rights

APR editor — Thu, 21 Jul 2022 02:16:00 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Biman Chand Prasad in Suva

The Pacific Islands Forum leaders’ meeting has ended and what is intriguing is the deafening silence on declining standards of democracy, governance, human rights, media freedom and freedom of speech issues, despite the serious and arguably worsening situation in some regional countries.

The emphasis on climate change is necessary and welcome. However, to deal effectively with climate adaptation and build climate-resilient infrastructure, countries have to mobilise large amounts of resources.

Whether these resources are effectively used will depend on standards of governance, transparency and accountability. Without these, efforts to deal with the climate change emergency will be fraught with difficulties and wastage of resources.

In any case, not everything can be reduced to climate change, which too often becomes a convenient way of avoiding other hard issues and diverting attention from domestic issues. And we do have other important pressing issues, such as media rights and freedom of expression, that deserve a hearing at the highest levels of this august body, but these were conveniently swept under the “sensitive topic” carpet, or so it seems.

Human rights — including freedom of speech — underpin all other rights, and it is unfortunate that this Forum failed in its moral obligation to send out a strong message of its commitment to upholding these rights.

Australia and New Zealand are regarded as the doyens of human rights and media freedom in the region, and their leaders’ presence at the Forum presented an opportunity to send a strong signal to member countries about the sanctity of these values — but the moment passed without any statement.

Anthony Albanese and Jacinda Ardern could have taken the initiative and spoken out about these issues of their own accord, but they didn’t, thus giving some credence to voices that claim that when it comes to the Forum, Australia and New Zealand are preoccupied with their own strategic interests first, and the interests of Pacific Island countries second.

Avoiding ‘unpalatable topics’
Towards this end, the two leaders from the Western world seemed at pains to avoid topics deemed unpalatable to their Pacific Island counterparts, seemingly over fears of pushing them further into the arms of China.

This includes an apparent fear of upsetting Fiji, which has had a draconian and punitive Media Act in place since 2010. There are also concerns in Fiji about the independence of important offices, such as the Electoral Commission, which are especially pressing in an election year.

The Fiji government is also denying the rights of thousands of tertiary students to access good quality education by withholding more than FJ$80 million (NZ$50 million) in grants to the University of the South Pacific.

Reportedly, during the meetings last week only the Prime Minister of Samoa, Fiamē Naomi Mata’afa, called on the Fiji government to release the grant.

Australia and New Zealand’s silence has given rise to criticism that they are practising the politics of convenience rather than principle and have lost moral ground in the Pacific region.

Appeasing autocratic leaders in our region as a strategy against China is not only unconscionable, it is also short-sighted and counterproductive.

A restrictive and undemocratic environment, where the media are suppressed and the people are denied a voice, is advantageous for China. It is thus in Australia and New Zealand’s best interests to fight against such trends by being vocal about them, instead of silent.

Appeasement not best strategy
The sooner Australia and New Zealand realise that appeasement is not the best strategy, the better it will be for them and for the region. If we are vuvale (one family) as Australia says, then we should look at our collective interest, rather than individual interests only.

Unfortunately, the Forum Secretariat chose not to invite the parliamentary opposition leaders in Fiji to any of the meeting’s events, even though they represent a sizable proportion of the country’s population.

This was another missed opportunity to get a fuller picture of the situation in Fiji instead of the official version only. It leads to a partial and poor understanding of what is happening, which is hardly the basis for sound decision-making.

As leaders of democracies, Australia and New Zealand need to move away from a self-centred approach, and adopt a more conscientious, long-term outlook in the region.

As it stands, in their preoccupation with and fear of China they seem to be losing sight of the goal. Australia and New Zealand should never compromise on governance and human rights and freedom of speech, the building blocks of democracy in the region.

Dr Biman Prasad is an adjunct professor at James Cook University and Punjabi University, and is currently a Member of Parliament and leader of the National Federation Party in Fiji. He is a former professor of economics and dean of the Faculty of Business and Economics at the University of the South Pacific. This article was first published by DevPolicy Blog and is republished under a Creative Commons licence.

Who will call out the misogyny and abuse undermining women’s academic freedom in NZ universities?

APR editor — Wed, 27 Apr 2022 07:33:32 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Richard Shaw, Massey University; Andrew Dickson, Massey University; Bevan Erueti, Massey University; Glenn Banks, Massey University; John O’Neill, Massey University, and Roger McEwan, Massey University

Threats, intimidation and misogyny have long been a reality for women in public life around the world, and the pandemic appears to have amplified this toxic reality.

Aotearoa New Zealand is led by one of the world’s best-known female prime ministers, Jacinda Ardern, and was the first country in the world to grant all women the right to vote.

Yet even here today, attempts to silence, diminish and demean the prime minister, female MPs and other prominent women have plumbed new depths, leading to calls for more robust policing of violent online and offline behaviour.

Unfortunately, the phenomenon extends well beyond elected representatives and public health professionals into most workplaces, including academia.

Women working in universities, including those in positions of academic leadership, are also routinely subjected to online vitriol intended to shut them down — and thus to prevent them exercising their academic freedom to probe, question and test orthodox ways of making sense of the world.

One of the commonest defences of abusive or threatening language (online or not) is an appeal to everyone’s right to free speech.

And this has echoes within universities, too, when academic freedom becomes a testing ground of what is acceptable and what isn’t.

A duty to call it out
The international evidence indicates that almost all of this behaviour comes from men, some of them colleagues or students of the women concerned.

The abuse comes in various forms (such as trolling and rape or death threats) and takes place in a variety of settings, including conferences. It is enabled by, among other things, the hierarchical nature of universities, in which power is stratified and unequally distributed, including on the basis of gender.

Threatened scholars warn that online harassment risks academic freedom. Rebekah Tromble and Patricia Rossini feared for their safety when the conservative online world turned against them last summerhttps://t.co/FZYo1e8Qzf pic.twitter.com/WLPGRRzIe0

— Times Higher Education (@timeshighered) February 15, 2019

As male academics we have an obligation not just to call out these sorts of behaviour but also to identify some of the corrosive consequences of the misogyny directed against women academics, wherever they may work.

We need to use our own academic freedom to assess what can happen to that of academic women when digital misogyny passes unchecked.

Whose freedom to speak?
Misogyny in university settings takes place in a particular context: universities have a statutory obligation to serve as producers and repositories of knowledge and expertise, and to act as society’s “conscience and critic”.

Academic freedom is what enables staff and students to carry out the work through which these obligations are met. This specific type of freedom is a means to various ends, including testing and contesting perceived truths, advancing the boundaries of knowledge and talking truth to power.

It is intended to serve the public good, and must be exercised in the context of the “highest ethical standards” and be open to public scrutiny.

A great deal has been written about threats to academic freedom: intrusive or risk averse university managers, the pressures to commercialise universities’ operations, and governments bent on surveilling and stifling internal dissent are the usual suspects.

But when women academics are subjected to online misogyny, which is a common response when they exercise academic freedom, we are talking about a different kind of threat.

Opinion: Misgendering students is not “academic freedom.” It’s an abuse of power. https://t.co/AatNwzrnB1

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) April 1, 2021

Betrayal of academic freedom
The misogynists seek to silence, shut down, diminish and demean; to ridicule on the basis of gender, and to deride scholarship that doesn’t align with their own preconceptions of gender and body type.

Their behaviour is neither casual nor accidental. As journalist Michelle Duff put it, it is intended to intimidate “as part of a concentrated effort to suppress women’s participation in public and political life”.

Its aim is to achieve the obverse of the purpose of academic freedom: to maintain an unequal status quo rather than change it.

It is to the credit of women academics that the misogynists frequently fail. But sometimes the hostility does have a chilling effect. For a woman to exercise her academic freedom when she is the target of online threats to rape or kill requires considerable bravery.

Women who continue to test perceived truths, advance the boundaries of knowledge and speak truth to power under such conditions are academic exemplars. They are contributing to the public good at considerable personal cost.

‘Whaddarya?’
The online misogyny directed at women academics is taking place in a broader context in which violent language targeting individuals and minority groups is becoming increasingly graphic, normalised and visible.

We do not believe the misogynistic “righteous outrage” directed at academic women is justified under the statutory underpinnings of freedom of speech.

Freedom of speech — within or beyond a university — is not absolute, and to the extent that it is invoked to cloak violent rhetoric against women, existing constraints on that freedom (which are better thought of as protections for the targets of misogyny) need strengthening.

Men who engage in online misogyny almost always speak from an (unacknowledged) position of privilege. Moreover, by hiding their sense of entitlement behind core democratic notions, their self-indulgence does all of us a disfavour.

With academic freedom comes the moral responsibility to challenge misogyny and not stay silent. What so many women across New Zealand’s tertiary sector are subject to poses a challenge to men everywhere.

The kind of conduct our women colleagues are routinely subjected to is the sort of behaviour at the heart of Greg McGee’s seminal critique of masculinity and masculine insecurity in New Zealand, the play Foreskin’s Lament. In the final scene of the play, the main character stares out at the audience and asks: “Whaddarya, whaddarya, whaddarya?”

He might have been asking the question of every man, including those of us who work in universities.

Dr Richard Shaw is professor of politics, Massey University; Dr Andrew Dickson is senior lecturer, Massey University; Dr Bevan Erueti, senior lecturer — Health Promotion/Associate Dean — Māori, Massey University; Dr Glenn Banks is professor of geography and head of school, School of People, Environment and Planning, Massey University; Dr John O’Neill, head of the Institute of Education te Kura o Te Mātauranga, Massey University, and Dr Roger McEwan is senior lecturer, Massey University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Universities must act to prevent espionage and foreign interference, but national laws still threaten academic freedom

APR editor — Thu, 31 Mar 2022 09:03:46 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Sarah Kendall, The University of Queensland

This week, the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security released its much anticipated report on national security threats affecting the higher education and research sector.

The 171-page report found the sector is a target for foreign powers using “the full set of tools” against Australia, which can undermine our sovereignty and threaten academic freedom.

It made 27 recommendations to “harden the operating environment to deny adversaries the ability to engage in the national security risks in the sector”.

The committee’s recommendations, when correctly implemented, will go a long way towards combating the threat of espionage and foreign interference. But they are not enough to protect academic freedom.

This is because the laws that make espionage and foreign interference a crime could capture legitimate research endeavours.

National security risks to higher education and research
The joint committee found there are several national security threats to the higher education and research sector. Most significant are foreign interference against students and staff, espionage and data theft.

This includes theft via talent recruitment programmes where Australian academics working on sensitive technologies are recruited to work at foreign institutions.

These threats have been occurring through cyber attacks and human means, including actors working in Australia covertly on behalf of a foreign government.

Foreign adversaries may target information on research that can be commercialised or used for national gain purposes.

The kind of information targeted is not limited to military or defence, but includes valuable technologies or information in any domain such as as agriculture, medicine, energy and manufacturing.

What did the committee recommend?
The committee stated that “awareness, acknowledgement and genuine proactive measures” are the next steps academic institutions must take to degrade the corrosive effects of these national security risks.

Of its 27 recommendations, the committee made four “headline” recommendations. These include:

A university-wide campaign of active transparency about the national security risks (overseen by the University Foreign Interference Taskforce)
adherence to the taskforce guidelines by universities. These include having frameworks for managing national security risks and implementing a cybersecurity strategy
introducing training on national security issues for staff and students
guidance for universities on how to implement penalties for foreign interference activities on campus.

New & long-awaited parliamentary report (PJCIS) on foreign interference at Australian universities. It makes strong recommendations to unis & government on ways to counter state-backed harassment & intimidation & protect students & staff. https://t.co/7I8mI52gb9 pic.twitter.com/uTlMWzDCkv

— Elaine Pearson (@PearsonElaine) March 29, 2022

Other recommendations include creation of a mechanism to allow students to anonymously report instances of foreign interference on campus and diversification of the international student population.

What about academic freedom?
Espionage makes it a crime to deal with information on behalf of, or to communicate to, a foreign principal (such as a foreign government or a person acting on their behalf). The person may also need to intend to prejudice, or be reckless in prejudicing, Australia’s national security.

In the context of the espionage and foreign interference offences, “national security” means defence of Australia.

It also means Australia’s international relations with other countries. “Prejudice” means something more than mere embarrassment.

So, an academic might intend to prejudice Australia’s national security where they engage in a research project that results in criticism of Australian military or intelligence policies or practices; or catalogues Australian government misconduct in its dealings with other countries.

Because “foreign principals” are part of the larger global audience, publication of these research results could be an espionage offence.

The academic may even have committed an offence when teaching students about this research in class (because Australia has a large proportion of international students, some of whom may be acting on behalf of foreign actors), communicating with colleagues working overseas (because foreign public universities could be “foreign principals”), or simply engaging in preliminary research (because it is an offence to do things to prepare for espionage).

Even communicating about research with overseas colleagues could fall foul of espionage and foreign interference laws. Image: The Conversation/Shutterstock

Foreign interference makes it a crime to engage in covert or deceptive conduct on behalf of a foreign principal where the person intends to (or is reckless as to whether they will) influence a political or governmental process, or prejudice Australia’s national security.

The covert or deceptive nature of the conduct could be in relation to any part of the person’s conduct.

So, an academic working for a foreign public university (a “foreign principal”, even if the country is one of our allies) may inadvertently commit the crime of foreign interference where they run a research project that involves anonymous survey responses to collect information to advocate for Australian electoral law reform.

The anonymous nature of the survey may be sufficient for the academic’s conduct to be “covert”.

Because it is a crime to prepare for foreign interference, the academic may also have committed an offence by simply taking any steps towards publication of the research results (including preliminary research or writing a first draft).

The kind of research criminalised by the espionage and foreign interference offences may be important public interest research. It may also produce knowledge and ideas that are necessary for the exchange of information which underpins our liberal democracy.

Criminalising this conduct risks undermining academic freedom and eroding core democratic principles.

So, how can we protect academic freedom?
In addition to implementing the recommendations in the report, we must reform our national security crimes to protect academic freedom in Australia. While the committee acknowledged the adequacy of these crimes to mitigate the national security threats against the research sector, it did not consider the overreach of these laws.

Legitimate research endeavours could be better protected if a “national interest” defence to a charge of espionage or foreign interference were introduced. This would be similar to “public interest” defences and protect conduct done in the national interest.

“National interest” should be flexible enough so various liberal democratic values — including academic freedom, press freedom, government accountability, and protection of human rights — can be considered alongside national security.

In the absence of a federal bill of rights, such a defence would go a long way towards ensuring legitimate research is protected and academic freedom in Australia is upheld.

Sarah Kendall is a PhD candidate in law, The University of Queensland. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

What does ‘academic freedom’ mean in practice? Why the Siouxsie Wiles and Shaun Hendy employment case matters

APR editor — Fri, 14 Jan 2022 10:43:59 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Jack Heinemann, University of Canterbury

Two high-profile University of Auckland academics raised important questions about academic freedom with their complaint to the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) that their employer had failed its duty of care to them.

Associate Professor Siouxsie Wiles and Professor Shaun Hendy have become well known for their work explaining the science behind covid-19 and guiding the public and government response.

But not everyone has agreed with that response or valued their contribution, and the academics have been threatened by what they have called “a small but venomous sector of the public”. They argued the university had not adequately responded to their safety concerns and requests for protection.

The case has now been referred to the Employment Court and the outcome for all parties remains unknown.

My focus is on the initial determination by the ERA, which referred to a letter from the university to Wiles and Hendy in August 2021 that urged them “to keep their public commentary to a minimum and suggested they take paid leave to enable them ‘to minimise any social media comments at present’.”

According to the ERA, this advice was “apparently given after [the university] received recommendations from its legal advisors to amend its policies so as to ‘not require’ its employees to provide public commentary, in order to limit its potential liability for online harassment.”

The ERA also noted the university “says that the applicants are not ‘expected’ or required to provide public commentary on COVID-19 as part of their employment or roles with the respondent, but it acknowledges they are entitled to do so.”

This issue is central to my concerns about academic freedom.

Some words from me on the abuse and harassment I’ve been subjected to on a near-daily basis for almost 2 years as a scientist speaking to the media about the pandemic https://t.co/qpvy2VJHMs

— Dr Siouxsie Wiles (@SiouxsieW) January 7, 2022

Freedom and risk
The academics argued that the university is statutorily required to “accept a role as critic and conscience of society” – as is set out under section 268 of the Education and Training Act 2020.

Universities routinely fulfil this role when academic staff and students state controversial or unpopular opinions and the results of their independent scholarship. Asking academics to step back from those roles to avoid risk seems to acknowledge that the threat derives from them doing their work.

I also fail to see how it would mitigate risk. An electrician who tried to mitigate the risk of electrocution by spending less time around wires hasn’t actually reduced the risk of electrocution when doing their job. They’ve just reduced the amount of time they are doing their job.

The Auckland academics are not the first to receive threats because of their “critic and conscience” activities. In the US, my former boss Dr Anthony Fauci says he, too, has received death threats from members of the public because of his work on the pandemic.

Less visible but still damaging threats or derogatory comments can come from within the university community, too. Systemic discrimination based on gender and race is well documented in academia. And increasingly, there are conflicts arising out of commercial interests in public research organisations.

Elsewhere it can be even more dangerous, such as the state-sponsored attacks on academics reported in Turkey. As a fellow scientist, I empathise with colleagues forced into the spotlight by virtue of their expertise or conscience.

Uses and limits of institutional power
Universities provide an important protection of academic freedom by not using their power as employers to stifle opinion. But it’s not enough. Universities should be more active in enabling academics to fulfil their role as critic and conscience of society so that, as expected by parliament, academic freedom is “preserved and enhanced”.

Professor Shaun Hendy … well known for his work explaining the science behind covid-19 and guiding the public and government response. Image: The Conversation/Getty

But there are also limits. No university in Aotearoa New Zealand has the scale to protect its students and staff from the concerted actions of a hostile country, a multi-billion dollar multinational company, or even the whispers of co-conspirators at coffee breaks during the ranking of grants.

What universities should do cannot exceed what they can do.

A coalition of government, universities, unions, staff and students needs to work together to redefine what can be done.

The government could reaffirm its commitment to critic-and-conscience activities by creating or re-purposing funding explicitly for these. Accountability will follow because universities would be required to expose that activity to public oversight.

The expectations of the university and the government to preserve and enhance academic freedom should become a normal conversation.

The risk is governments might want to influence what does and does not constitute being a critic and conscience of society, and use funding to stifle criticism of its policies. While this risk exists already, the temptation to constrain academic freedom could become stronger.

But balance would be provided by using the United Nations’ higher education declaration as a benchmark, through the transparency of the funding accountability exercise, and the declared precondition the funding allocation process be subject to ongoing and open scrutiny by university staff and students.

Accepting risk with freedom
Universities would be expected to use their additional resources to enable students and staff, as safely as possible, to use their academic freedom for public service.

Jurisdictional responsibilities could be negotiated between universities and government so that, where appropriate, a threat requiring more than campus security would be covered by the country’s police or defence resources.

But students and staff have some responsibilities, too. The university community cannot and should not leave its own protection to others. It needs to take a greater role in self-policing prejudice, privilege and conflicts of interest within the academic community itself.

Confronting the ultimate holders of power within their own academies and professional bodies will be the most painful action for members. But it would be worse for the community to fail in this and therefore do less as the critic and conscience of society.

If the use of academic freedom did not create risk, parliament would not have needed to legislate for its protection. But that risk should not be shouldered by Wiles and Hendy, or anyone else, alone.

Dr Jack Heinemann is professor of molecular biology and genetics at the University of Canterbury. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

‘Shame on you, Fiji’, says human rights advocate over Professor Lal’s exile

APR editor — Thu, 30 Dec 2021 06:46:53 +0000

By Christine Rovoi, RNZ Pacific journalist

A human rights advocate in Fiji says the country should be ashamed of the exile of the now dead celebrated academic professor Brij Lal and his family.

Professor Lal was expelled from Fiji in 2009 after speaking out against coup leader Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama’s FijiFirst government.

Lal died at his home in Brisbane on Christmas Day. Tributes have been pouring in since.

Rights advocate Shamima Ali, coordinator of the Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre, said that while the region mourned Professor Lal’s death, people should not forget the injustice meted out to him and his wife.

Ali said the government disrespected academia and the contributions academics made to Fiji’s development.

In the case of the Lals, Ali said there had been a “miscarriage of justice and a gross violation of their basic human rights — the right to nationality and citizenship and to a fair trial”.

Ali said Lal’s “writings and utterances irked the government” so they banned him from Fiji.

‘Smacks of sexism’
“And Dr Padma Lal, along with her husband, was also banned from Fiji.

“This smacks of sexism and once again disregards Dr Lal’s illustrious career as an ecological economist and her work on the sugar industry and environment.

“I urge the Fiji Human Rights and Anti Discrimination Commission to step up and challenge this draconian decision of arbitrarily banning citizens and taking away their birthright.”

Professor Brij Lal … deported from Fiji in 2009, but tributes have been flowing since his death on Christmas Day. Image: RNZ

Lal’s legacy would live on as an upstanding human being and citizen of our country, Ali said.

“Shame on you, Fiji. Those who violated his and Padma’s rights will surely live in ignominy and infamy.

“There is still time for a change, to amend the wrongs, too late for Brij but not for his family.”

Sad day for Fiji, says Sodelpa
Fiji’s main opposition party said the death of Professor Lal in exile was a sad time for Fiji.

The Social Democratic Liberal Party said Lal had hoped that he would one day return to his homeland.

Fiji claimed to have democracy but it still has a very long way to go, said Sodelpa leader Viliame Gavoka.

“The news of Professor Brij Lal’s passing fills me with great pain,” he said.

“We all know about him, a favourite son of Fiji who was refused permission to return home.

“He lived and hoped that he would one day come home and many of us pleaded for his case.”

But Gavoka said now he had died in a foreign land, away from his people and loved ones.

“How can our hearts be so hardened that we denied someone the right to his homeland and all because he expressed views different from those at the helm of leadership.

“Professor Brij Lal was loved by many and his legacy will live on in Fiji.”

Fiji poorer with loss of academic, says NFP
Among historians and scholars, Professor Lal stood tall around the world, said the National Federation Party.

From a poor farming family in Tabia, Vanua Levu, NFP leader Professor Biman Prasad said Professor Lal rose to be an emeritus professor of Pacific and Asian history at the Australian National University, one of the world’s highest-ranked places of learning.

“He was an acknowledged expert on the Indian diaspora around the world.

He was recognised as the pre-eminent historian on the history of indenture and Girmitiya.”

In his obituary to Professor Lal, Dr Prasad said Fiji was poorer with the passing of the academic.

“Professor Brij Lal banished from the land of his birth by the Bainimarama government in November 2009 for championing democracy and barred from entering Fiji upon the orders of the prime minister, has died, 12 years after the draconian act of a heartless government,” Dr Prasad said.

“The sudden and shocking death of Professor Brij Lal at the age of 69 should create a moment for all Fiji citizens to pause and reflect, even while we are distracted by our many personal challenges brought on by the pandemic and our other deep national problems.”

Dr Prasad said Lal was “a giant on the international academic stage” who was banned by the Bainimarama and FijiFirst government from returning to the place of his birth.

“But the pettiness of our leaders will not take away Prof Lal’s towering achievements and scholarship, for which he will one day be fully recognised in the place he was born.

“All of us in Fiji are the poorer for his irreplaceable loss.”

Dr Prasad said the NFP had organised a condolence gathering to remember Professor Lal.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Are New Zealand’s universities doing enough to define the limits of academic freedom?

APR editor — Tue, 23 Nov 2021 20:16:29 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Matheson Russell, University of Auckland

The news last week that University of Auckland public health researcher Dr Simon Thornley was retracting a co-authored paper about supposed vaccination risks during pregnancy raised deeper questions about the limits of academic freedom.

Dr Thornley’s own head of department had called for the paper to be retracted due to “the anxiety it is creating for expectant parents and those planning to have a child”. Other experts in the field had strongly criticised the paper’s methodology and conclusions.

The university itself responded publicly by asserting, “As an academic staff member […] Dr Thornley has the right to exercise his academic freedom.”

The vice-chancellor later said, “While the university supports academic freedom, we do require research to be conducted with a high degree of integrity.”

The controversy follows an earlier one in July, when a group of academics published an open letter questioning the scientific status of mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge). The Royal Society Te Apārangi issued a statement rejecting their views and affirming the value of mātauranga Māori as a knowledge system.

The society is now reported to be investigating two of its fellows who were co-authors of the letter.

In response, a group calling itself the Free Speech Union has called the Royal Society’s response an attack on free speech, saying it sends “a chilling message” to other academics.

Covid-19 vaccination paper criticised as ‘disinformation’ is being withdrawn, co-author Simon Thornley says https://t.co/WZFF068Gdj

— Stuff (@NZStuff) November 16, 2021

Freedom and integrity
These are just two of several conflicts currently playing out in Aotearoa New Zealand over the limits of academic freedom.

Tricky trade-offs surround particular cases like these, and they are not easily resolved. But debates over difficult cases are too often hampered by shallow conceptions of the role of universities within society and flimsy understandings of academic freedom.

Public universities have a public mission: they serve society through generating new knowledge and teaching students. They also, in the language of the Education and Training Act 2020, serve as a “repository of knowledge and expertise” and play a role as “critic and conscience of society”.

University staff and students are granted certain freedoms under the act to fulfil these socially valuable functions.

Two fundamental ideas provide the rationale for academic freedom. The first is that freedom of inquiry is essential for the advancement of knowledge.

Without the freedom to explore new ideas and to test received wisdom, the quest for knowledge cannot progress.

The second is the idea that universities should be free from interference that would corrupt the integrity of research and the dissemination of research findings. It is in the public’s interests that neither the state nor private individuals and corporations are allowed to muzzle researchers from publicising what they know when the public would benefit from knowing.

A debate over science’s role in colonisation and the status of mātauranga Māori has spiralled into a disciplinary process and sparked concerns about impingement on academic freedoms. @SamSachdevaNZ reports https://t.co/H8a4c0GKMJ

— Newsroom (@NewsroomNZ) November 17, 2021

High ethical standards
Institutional autonomy and the right to critically question are essential if universities are to be reliable sources of knowledge and expertise for society at large. But neither implies academics should be free to do what they like or to say what they like with impunity.

The Education and Training Act couples the freedoms granted to universities with expectations of public accountability. It says tertiary institutions should have

as much independence and freedom to make academic, operational, and management decisions as is consistent with the nature of the services they provide, the efficient use of national resources, the national interest, and the demands of accountability.

In turn, the legislation places on tertiary institutions the responsibility to ensure the “highest ethical standards” are maintained.

That’s as it should be. Just as we expect medical associations to hold doctors accountable to high standards of competent practice and ethical conduct, so should we expect tertiary institutions to hold academics to the same high standards.

Critic and conscience
Controversial or unpopular opinions are sometimes just what society needs to hear. That’s why the law recognises a “critic and conscience of society” role for academics — the role of speaking truth to power, as we like to say.

But the usefulness of dissenting views to society cannot be defended if these opinions rest on faulty evidence or demonstrable falsehoods. Misinformation is incompatible with performing a role as critic and conscience of society.

From the public’s point of view, a university is malfunctioning if it harbours and protects misinformation. It ceases to be a reliable source of knowledge and expertise.

Likewise, academic freedom does not provide an exemption from ethical standards. Like all public institutions, we should expect universities to be places that foster healthy and respectful relationships, and serve wider societal goals of improving well-being, overcoming injustices and combating environmental destruction.

Universities that tolerate bullying and harassment of staff and students, or marginalise already disadvantaged social groups, fail to live up to their public mission.

Leadership needed
New Zealand universities need to look hard at these issues. In today’s political and media environment, the challenge of mis- and disinformation is only going to intensify. Institutional culture, practices and policies need to account for this.

And universities have barely begun to address the reality that campuses are often experienced as hostile spaces by minority groups, not least Māori and Pacific staff and students.

A genuine democratisation of university life — including tackling institutional racism — is also vital to ensure all communities in Aotearoa New Zealand can see themselves as participants in and beneficiaries of what universities do. Principles of Te Tiriti o Waitangi should not only be acknowledged but given meaningful expression.

Hard work will be required for our universities to become highly trusted institutions by all communities. This is especially true of tangata whenua and Pacific people.

In fact, our tertiary institutions have a lot to learn from tangata whenua about handling disagreements and responding to unethical behaviour in a way that upholds the mana of all involved.

We would do well to take a lead from legal scholar Moana Jackson who has envisioned universities as “a marae ātea where robust debate and criticism should flourish”, but also as “a whare where relationships should be nurtured and enhanced, and where all students and staff should feel safe and free”.

To realise such a vision will require clear-headed and courageous leadership at all levels within our universities.

Dr Matheson Russell is associate professor of philosophy, University of Auckland. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Future of AUT’s Pacific Media Centre still up in the air

Pacific Media Watch — Mon, 17 May 2021 20:14:41 +0000

By Justin Wong in Auckland

Auckland University of Technology has denied it is sidelining the Pacific Media Centre in the School of Communication Studies, but it is yet to announce the new leadership following disputes over office space and a succession plan.

The multi-disciplinary research and professional development unit was founded in 2007 by Professor David Robie with a focus on Pacific media research and producing stories of marginalised communities in New Zealand and the Asia-Pacific region.

The centre also housed several outlets that provided journalists covering regional issues and Pasifika researchers a space to publish their work, such as the academic journal Pacific Journalism Review and the award-winning Pacific Media Watch.

Dr Robie retired last December as the centre’s director but the position was not filled immediately. There have been no updates from the PMC’s website, YouTube and Soundcloud channels since, while Southern Cross, the weekly radio segment produced by the PMC on 95bFM’s The Wire at Auckland University has not had a new episode since last August.

The Pacific Media Centre news and current affairs website … now silent. Image: APR screenshot PMC

Only one month after his retirement, Dr Robie was told that the PMC’s office on the 10th floor of the WG Building had been emptied of its awards, theses, books and other memorabilia, with people involved with the centre not being notified or consulted about the move.

The Pacific Newsroom reported that the contents, including a traditional carved Papua New Guinean storyboard presented by then Pacific Island Affairs Minister Luamanuvao Dame Winnie Laban to celebrate the centre’s opening in October 2007, had been removed “with the lack of a coherent explanation from AUT”.

Dr Robie told Debate in April that there was a gap between what was said by AUT and “reality”, saying that the office being cleared out affirmed a lack of commitment by the university for the PMC’s future.

He also said a succession plan drawn up several years ago that had involved “headhunting” possible successors before his sabbatical in 2019 so the candidate could familiarise themselves with the role before formally taking over, but AUT did not follow through on this.

The Pacific Media Centre office in AUT’s Sir Paul Reeves Building … stripped clean in February. Image: PMC

A recent comment by media analyst Dr Gavin Ellis on Kiwi Journalists Association Facebook group about his Knightly Views column about the issue. Image: APR screenshot

‘Opportunity wasted by the school’
“This opportunity was wasted by the school and by the time I left, nobody had been prepared for continuity and the very able and talented people still working hard for the centre were not given support,” he said.

“This is unconscionable in my view.

“The school needs to listen to the vision of the stakeholders and treat them with respect.”

The move was also criticised by journalists and academics, with the influential Sydney-based Australia Asia Pacific Media Initiative (AAPMI) advocacy group calling on AUT’s vice-chancellor Derek McCormack in an open letter in February to ensure that the PMC would continue to be developed “at a time when Pacific journalism is under existential threat”.

Meanwhile, Dr Camille Nakhid, the chair of the PMC’s advisory board and an associate professor in AUT’s School of Social Sciences and Public Policy, told The Spinoff that she believed the PMC directorship should be advertised externally to “attract a range of qualified candidates”.

Dr Rosser Johnson, the head of AUT’s School of Communications Studies, told Debate at the end of April that the office “relocation” was due to security reasons and the PMC’s “new space” on the 12th floor of the WG Building has “twice as much office space” for students and affiliate researchers.

The new PMC leadership had been expected to be announced in April, but has been again delayed.

‘Expensive specialist gear’
“There’s one department who uses specialist gear that is very expensive and we have a very high level of risk around that gear,” Dr Johnson said.

“We had to consider the space that the Pacific Media Centre was in because it can be made secure through two sets of security doors.”

The school also scheduled two faculty and school-wide planning days to talk with people who would be affected.

Dr Johnson said the School had opted for an expression of interest approach within the department to fill Dr Robie’s position because the original plan did not follow protocol. An external hiring freeze imposed by AUT last year and the part-time nature of the PMC’s directorship meant the school preferred to look internally.

“David [Robie] was asking if it was possible for us to shoulder-tap two or three people to be co-directors but the School is supposed to have a transparent process where everyone who wants to be considered can be considered.

“If you want to grow and develop a research culture, it makes sense to look internally first.”

Dr Johnson also said he respected the care and commitment Dr Robie had towards the PMC, but insisted the school had no intention to shape the centre’s future direction, as the responsibility would fall on the next director.

Justin Wong is a postgraduate student journalist at AUT. He is also the student news reporter at AUT’s Debate magazine and the presenter of The Wire on student radio station 95bFM at the University of Auckland. This article is republished with permission from Debate and the author.

Media freedom fraternity must counter attacks on j-education, says JERAA

APR editor — Sun, 02 May 2021 23:28:04 +0000

Asia Pacific Report newsdesk

Australia’s leading journalism education advocacy body has marked World Press Freedom Day by condemning attacks on journalism education and research, including individual academics.

President Dr Alexandra Wake of the Journalism Education and Research Association of Australia (JERAA) said such attacks had a real impact on press freedom, adding: “I call on all those who want quality journalism in Australia to flourish, to support our work within the academy”.

In a statement released today, she said that in the past year:

the cost of journalism degrees had increased by 110 percent,
universities had been “ditching journalism programmes”,
headlines about job losses were encouraging “our best and brightest students” to choose other courses of study, and
some parts of the media continued attacks on universities and individual academics.

“Journalist watchdogs, like all other professionals, must be trained,” she said.

“They do not learn their skills by osmosis in understaffed news organisations, stripped of senior staff.”

Dr Wake’s statement said:

Focus on attacks on journalism education

“On World Press Freedom Day 2021 I would like us to focus on how attacks on journalism education and research, including on individual academics, have a real impact on press freedom in Australia. I call on all those who want quality journalism in Australia to flourish, to support our work within the academy.

“In the past year we have seen the cost of journalism degrees increase by 110 percent, universities ditching journalism programmes, headlines about job losses encouraging our best and brightest students to choose other courses of study, and some parts of the media continuing their attacks on universities and individual academics.

“However, it is within Australia’s universities that much world-leading research is happening, seeking out answers for our ailing industry, not just around financial viability, but also around important social issues – from the need for greater diversity, equity and inclusion to ethics and artificial intelligence, misinformation and regional security issues.

“It is also within our universities that budding journalists are trained in all the skills of journalism: from fact checking and verification to data analysis and analytics, while still learning to write and broadcast news stories which ask the tough questions of the rich and powerful.

“Journalist watchdogs, like all other professionals, must be trained. They do not learn their skills by osmosis in understaffed news organisations, stripped of senior staff. At universities we not only teach new recruits to be watchdogs, we ask them to consider themselves as guide dogs showing audiences which issues are worth the investment of their time, and even therapy dogs to help build and rebuild communities.

“Journalists within the university system work in all kinds of roles, sometimes in traditional modes, with others experimenting with new styles and theories of journalism. In fact, some of the highest quality journalism currently taking place is produced by students and academics. It is often under the guidance of academic staff, most of whom were long-time journos, that students have won the highest local, national and even international journalism awards.

“Journalism programmes clearly don’t just result in jobs in journalism. But such a course of study does give students the opportunity to develop their critical thinking skills, to build their knowledge of the world, and it gives them the time to think deeply about the issues that need changing in the world.

“Many of our graduates have thanked us for their training in journalism even those who later choose careers in medicine, engineering, politics and international development.

Vital life-long skills
“Undergraduate journalism degrees certainly give students vital life-long skills of media literacy, while graduate diploma and masters programmes in journalism result in highly-skilled and deep thinking journalists.

“I do not claim that all of Australia’s journalism programs are perfect, but all those who work in journalism within the academy are constantly reviewing curricula and upskilling for the current and future industry requirements.

“Journalism programmes aren’t stuck in what some newsroom leaders learned in the 1980s, or 2000s. Today’s classes are filled with tools and skills to debunk ‘deep fakes’ and edit incredible sound. Industry professionals are brought in to ensure the students know what is expected in the modern workforce.

“But with so many newsrooms now devoid of senior staff with the time to guide younger recruits, in many cases, that role has reverted to their academic.

“More than ever before new journalists find that the only people available to support them, particularly when they are under siege as freelancers, or are within an unwelcoming newsroom is their former lecturer.

“Although this year I am raising concerns about a lack of support for journalism education and research as a key press freedom issue for Australia, I do not overlook the serious issues faced by Australian journalists working on the front line of covid-19, under the gaze of an unsympathetic public.

Australians in jail
“We also remain concerned about the Australians who are in jail in China (Cheng Lei) and the UK (Julian Assange), the very difficult work conditions faced by women, particularly Indigenous women, women of colour and those with disabilities. These are issues which fill our classrooms and conversations with students and all have been heighted during covid.

“As covid-19 continues to wreak havoc around the world, I would like to call on all those who support excellent journalism – university leaders, newsroom bosses, parents, and philanthropists – to be more vocal in their support of journalism education and research, the overlooked but vital supplier of current and future talent, ideas and solutions.”

Dr Alexandra Wake
President
Journalism Education and Research Association of Australia

Deportation a ‘distraction’ from USP’s boom performance, says Ahluwalia

APR editor — Thu, 11 Feb 2021 09:12:00 +0000

By RNZ Pacific

The deported vice-chancellor of the University of the South Pacific says booming student enrolments are a vote of confidence in the regional institution.

Professor Pal Ahluwalia said numbers were up 23 percent on last year.

Professor Ahluwalia was arrested and deported with his wife last week by Fiji authorities.

READ MORE: Other USP saga reports

The lack of consultation by Fiji with other regional government partners in the 12-nation university has led to a formal USP Council investigation.

Professor Ahluwalia said the “saga” was a distraction from the strong performance of the university.

Despite his sidelining, he said it was good to see the university flourish.

“It shows that our students are voting with their feet. I’ve been making this very clear that the USP is bigger than any single person and I’m confident that if and when I’m allowed to return to my position, wherever it is, that we will just become stronger and stronger.”

Professor Ahluwalia said he was proud of the USP’s executive, directors and academic staff for achieving such strong results.

“I’m confident the team will get the academic year off to a strong start despite my recent arrest in Fiji and deportation to Australia,” he said.

The actions of the Fiji government and USP Council representatives are being being investigated by a subcommittee of the regional institution.

Response to deportation in Fiji
Fiji’s Law Society and a human rights coalition have joined the widespread condemnation of the arrests and deportation of Ahluwalia and his wife Sandra Price.

The NGO Coalition for Human Rights said the extreme force employed by Immigration officials and police was unacceptable and unjustified.

The deportations come after months of tensions between the university and the Fiji government, with staff and student protests erupting in June following the removal of Professor Ahluwalia and ongoing allegations of corruption and financial mismanagement by him against the former administration.

The coalition said the strong-armed approach by government did not reflect democratic principles or the human rights values Fiji championed in its role as president of the UN Human Rights Council.

Meanwhile, Fiji’s Law Society said deportation was not an answer to allegations of impropriety.

It called on the government to follow the rule of law, saying no authority should exercise undue force when there were mechanisms to deal with such matters.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Don’t touch academic freedom – why the Philippine military action is so intrusive and gross

APR editor — Mon, 08 Feb 2021 01:01:32 +0000

Jamela Alindogan reports from Manila on the attack on academic freedom. Video: Al Jazeera

Teachers and students in the Philippines are angry over the decision to allow military forces to enter the top state university. The 1989 deal was put in place to protect students from the warrantless arrests and constant surveillance by police and military forces that were common during the 1970s era of martial law. Mel Sta Maria at Rappler analyses the crisis.

ANALYSIS: By Mel Sta Maria in Manila

Because of the controversy resulting from the unilateral termination by the Defence Department (DND) of the University of the Philippines (UP) and the DND’s accord limiting the entry of security personnel inside UP, Commission of Higher Education (CHED) chair J. Prospero de Vera was quoted in news reports as saying a “panel of education experts will define the meaning of academic freedom and the role of security forces in the protection of academic freedom and the welfare of students.”

CHED or a “panel of experts” will define academic freedom for the University of the Philippines?

This is the most intrusive, gross, and unconstitutional governmental action that can ever be done in regard to education.

No governmental agency should define how academic freedom should be operationalised in UP and, for that matter, in any educational institution, like Ateneo de Manila University, Far Eastern University, Polytechnic University of the Philippines, De La Salle University, Mindanao State University, University of San Carlos, University of Sto. Tomas, and others.

The 1987 Constitution provides that “academic freedom shall be enjoyed in all institutions of higher learning” (Article 14 Section 5[2]). The operative verb is “shall” – not may, could, or any other discretionary word.

“Shall” is a command which all must observe unqualifiedly. No exact definition was made for a very fundamental reason.

From the constitutional deliberations, Commissioner Adolf Azcuna (who later became a Supreme Court associate justice) said: “Since academic freedom is a dynamic concept, we want to expand the frontiers of freedom, especially in education, therefore, we shall leave it to the court to develop further the parameters of academic freedom.”

The intent of the framers
The intent of the framers was not for the executive department, especially the CHED, to come up with an academic freedom “definition”. The task has been exclusively and particularly given to the Supreme Court “to develop further parameters of academic freedom”.

The reason is so obvious. The executive and Congress are political departments often imbued by temporal, erratic, and slanted motivations. Education cannot be left to these people.

And the Supreme Court did its job by enunciating the pillars of academic freedom. All institutions of higher learning have exclusively the constitutional right to decide on the following:

who may teach;
what may be taught;
how it shall be taught; and who may be admitted to study. (Ateneo de Manila vs. Capulong et. al., GR No. 99327 May 27, 1993).

Significantly, the Supreme Court did not provide any specific definition but only enumerated these 4 pillars so that academic freedom shall truly be expansive and free pursuant to the spirit and aspiration of the constitutional mandate.

For the CHED or any “panel of experts” to make a definition and impose it on UP or other schools will “straightjacket” or constrict academic freedom, opening it up to further so-called qualifications in the future.

If that happens, it will usher in the beginning of more, though gradual, intrusions. I dread the day when the CHED and the DND, on the pretext of “security” reasons, will give outlines or syllabus to teachers for them to teach students – worst, for the CHED or the police to sit in in a class to monitor whether the “right” “patriotic” lessons are properly taught.

State indoctrination
This is state indoctrination. An atmosphere of prior restraint will be created – a repugnant situation.

The Supreme Court’s parameters are enough guidance. There is no need to add anything. Neither is clarification necessary. Let us leave it at that. Let the institutions of higher learning principally decide what kind of atmosphere their education will have.

Justice Frankfurter, the most revered US Supreme Court magistrate on the subject of academic freedom, said: “It is the business of a university to provide that atmosphere which is most conducive to speculations, experiment, and creation.”

And the University of the Philippines, to show fidelity to that “business of a university” to provide the right educational atmosphere to its professors and students, entered into the accord with the DND.

UP grounds are public places which can be entered into by anybody. But, if they can be freely roamed by state agents with ulterior motives to monitor, overtly or clandestinely, UP’s academic community, education will be inhibited. That is not acceptable. The exclusionary nature of the accord therefore was important.

Without it, there will be an atmosphere where professors and students may exhibit uncalled for reservations in their discussions and research, talking and investigating less freely lest they may be mistaken as seditionist or terrorist by state agents roaming around the campus.

This undue self-restraint will destroy that “marketplace of ideas” which an educational institution should be.

What about ‘mistaken incitement’?
What if law or political science professors engage their students to research, debate, defend, or debunk the propriety or the pros and cons of socialism, Marxism, or even liberation theology, and roaming state agents, not experts in these topics, hear the discussions?

It is possible that, mistakenly, these professors may be suspected of inciting students to commit terrorism and then apprehended.

“This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.”

That quote is from Abraham Lincoln, one of the greatest United States presidents.

“A revolution, woven in the dim light of mystery, has kept me from you. Another revolution will return me to your arms, bring me back to life.”

This is one of the memorable quotes in El Filibusterismo, written by Jose Rizal.

What if a theatrical play created, written, produced, and directed by students were staged revolving around those statements? State agents without expertise on these matters may suspect these students of fomenting radical ideas and arrest them. The mere thought of such possibilities can restrain free expression, discussion, and analysis.

Accord termination ominous
The termination of the UP-DND accord is ominous especially in the light of the Anti-Terror-Law (ATL), where mere suspicion is the threshold for an arrest based on the vague provisions of the law.

Professors and students can be victimised by the ATL. For instance, government surveillance can be made on any suspected person except that “surveillance, interception, and recording of communications between lawyers and clients, doctors and patients, journalists and their sources, and confidential business correspondence shall not be authorized” (Section 16 of the ATL).

Professors and students are not exempted. Also, while “confidential business correspondence” is exempted, confidential educational correspondence between professors and students are not. These omissions portentously tell volumes on the vulnerability of professors and students.

With the UP-DND accord’s termination and the ATL’s implementation, the lure to control the conscience, the thought process, the learning, the outlook, the discernment of students, may just be too great for unscrupulous state officials to resist. This is disturbing.

Government officials should not tinker with academic freedom. Many Filipinos benefitted from its unadulterated concept. Many more have served the country well, performed their civic duties consistently, and gave hope to future generations.

A definition by a “panel of experts” will not only define for educational institutions what academic freedom is; more dangerously, it will effectively dictate to them what academic freedom is not; what it no longer means. That is destructive and constitutionally abhorrent.

Dr Mel Sta Maria is dean of the Far Eastern University (FEU) Institute of Law in the Philippines. He teaches law at FEU and the Ateneo School of Law, hosts shows on both radio and YouTube, and has authored several books on law, politics, and current events.

Politicians, educators, advocates blast Fiji’s ‘barbaric’ expulsion of USP head

Pacific Media Watch — Thu, 04 Feb 2021 00:53:49 +0000

Asia Pacific Report newsdesk

Politicians, educators and civil society advocates around the region today condemned the “barbaric” and “shameful” detention and deportation of the regional University of the South Pacific’s vice-chancellor Professor Pal Ahluwalia and his wife.

Reformist Professor Ahluwalia, an Australian citizen, and his wife, Sandra, were detained by Fiji authorities at their Suva home late last night and deported on a flight to Brisbane this morning.

The USP Council is due to meet in Suva tomorrow and the chancellor, Nauru Lionel Aingimea said today a statement would be made later.

In Rarotonga, the director of USP’s Cook Islands campus, Dr Debbie Futter-Puati, said the university’s independence was under threat in Fiji.

Responding to questions from The Fiji Times, she questioned how the university’s vice chancellor’s deportation would advantage the Fijian government.

“The University is a private, independent educational facility owned by 12 member countries who must surely take exception to this action,” she said.

“I sincerely hope member countries make a strong and united stance back to Fiji government on this aggressive and inappropriate action.”

‘Outrageous’ act
Human rights activist and former human rights commissioner Shamima Ali described the forceful removal and deportation as “shameful, outrageous and not the Pacific way”.

National Federation Party leader Professor Biman Prasad said at a time when Fiji should be supporting victims of cyclones Yasa and Ana, government was “instead focused [on] its own petty jealousies”.

#Fiji immigration officials, police deport #USP‘s reformist vice-chancellor Professor Pal Ahluwalia and wife in swoop @pal_vcp @USPEmaluscampus @wansolwara @USPWansolwara @ShailendraBSing #HumanRights #education #AsiaPacificReport #PacificMediaWatch https://t.co/vJQGMWeXqK pic.twitter.com/8Gb2R7lHO8

— David Robie (@DavidRobie) February 4, 2021

Social Democratic Liberal Party leader Viliame Gavoka condemned the arrest and deportation of Professor Ahluwalia and his wife as “barbaric treatment”.

The University of the South Pacific Staff Union and Association of USP Staff issued a joint statement today expressing “grave concern and disgust at the FijiFirst government’s” action.

“We are alarmed by the way that the government of Fiji broke into the vice-chancellor’s residence in the middle of the night (03.02.21) and orchestrated the removal of VCP Pal and his wife,” the unions said.

“The manner in which the VCP and his wife were removed is a violation of human rights and due process.

“Given the seriousness of the decision, we demand the Fiji government … provide the justification for this Gestapo tactic.”

The unions said USP was a regional organisation like Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, SPREP, FFA, SPC and demanded the same respect given to any regional organisation.

Chancellor defends UP as ‘bastion of academic freedom’ against military

APR editor — Wed, 20 Jan 2021 07:18:51 +0000

By Lorraine Ecarma in Cebu City

The University of the Philippines Visayas (UPV) will continue to stand against any threats to human rights, chancellor Clement Camposano has declared in response to the termination of a long-standing accord preventing military incursion on campus.

In a Facebook post, Camposano said the academic freedom in the university was “not something anyone can abrogate”.

“The University of the Philippines Visayas like the rest of the UP System, will remain a bastion of academic freedom,” he wrote.

READ MORE: Philippine student leaders point to history of state harassment

“This is not something anyone can abrogate. We will stand firm against any and all attempts to deprive us of our democratic rights.”

The brief statement was posted on Monday, hours after news broke of Defence Secretary Delfin Lorenzana’s decision to unilaterally terminate the decades-old pact between the University of the Philippines and the Department of National Defence preventing military and police presence in all UP System campuses.

In his official statement posted yesterday, the UP Visayas chancellor pointed to the tumultuous history between UP and the DND as the cause of the university’s apprehension.

“Historical events that have shaped the relationship of UP and the country’s security forces—many of these leaving wounds that have yet to heal—explain the university’s strong apprehensio,” he wrote.

‘Sordid reality of recent killings’
“While the Department of National Defence has given assurances that constitutionally guaranteed rights and freedoms would not be suppressed, these historical events and the sordid reality of recent killings, abductions, and other forms of human rights abuses widely believed to have been perpetrated by security forces cannot but leave us unassured.”

Seven senators filed for a resolution expressing their opposition to the unilateral termination of the UP-DND accord

The proposed resolution mentions the violent dispersal of the peaceful protest against the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020 in UP Cebu back in June 2020 pic.twitter.com/QMWUgD8g64

— UP Cebu (@UPCebuOfficial) January 20, 2021

Even before the scrapping of the accord, UP System universities in the Visayas have long decried unwarranted military and police presence in their campuses.

One of the most recent instances was the arrest of 8 protestors, collectively known as Cebu 8, during a picket rally against the then anti-terror bill held in front of the UP Cebu campus last June.

Videos of the arrest in social media showed police breaching the walls of UP Cebu to chase students and activists seeking refuge inside the campus.

And despite the government’s assurance that the accord’s termination was not meant to suppress activism and academic freedom in UP, students, faculty, and staff from UP Cebu said they have not forgotten about the arrest of Cebu 8.

The Unified Student Organisations of UP Cebu, along with the University Student Council, the All UP Academic Employees Union, and the university’s student publication Tug-ani came out with a joint statement condemning the termination.

“We remember the violent dispersal of the June 5th protest against the then Anti-Terrorism Bill last year, wherein armed non-uniformed PNP personnel chased protesters inside the campus and groundlessly detained 8 individuals, including a bystander, now collectively known as the Cebu 8,” the statement reads.

“Protect academic freedom” and “maintain UP as a safe haven for all beliefs and forms of democratic expression”: UP President Danilo Concepcion responds to DND Secretary Lorenzana’s unilateral abrogation of the UP-DND Accord.

Read in full: https://t.co/e48sUoEqqz pic.twitter.com/xmdVDOr7hN

— University of the Philippines (@upsystem) January 19, 2021

Death threats against union president
The unified organisations also pointed out the arrest of UP Cebu alumna Myles Albasin of Mabinay 6 and the death threats received by faculty union president Regletto Imbong earlier this month as “one of one of the many UP-DND Accord violations and harassments” that had been committed.

They added the termination of the UP-DND agreement was a disrespect to the martyrs from the university who died in the pursuit of democracy during martial law, and enjoined the administration to remain firm against any threats academic freedom.

“For the DND to end this accord is already an admission of either their ignorance of the country’s history or their blatant disrespect of the martyrs who fought for the freedoms we enjoy today and now the Duterte administration is desperately trying to snatch away from us again,” they said.

“We collectively call upon the UP administration, UP board of regents to affirm their mandate in ensuring that UP shall remain a zone of peace and refuge; to defend the university against the DND’s attempt of militarising our schools, and to stand and fight against all fascist manoeuvres that threaten our academic freedom and basic rights,” they added.

In her official statement, UP Cebu chancellor Liza Corro said the abrogation without consultation of the agreement was “deeply concerning to say the least,” considering the many threats faced by UP Cebu.

“Especially for us here in UP Cebu, as it came at a time, when our students and faculty members have been subjected to direct intimidation and threats, including red-tagging… We strongly condemned such acts of transgression and bullying,” Corro wrote.

She went on to defend Imbong, describing him as an “academic scholar of good standing” who was active not only in the academe but also in campaigning for social justice.

“His active engagements to help elevate social ills, is inherent in his basic task as a UP constituent, in fact as a good and responsible Filipino citizen. This does not make him an insurgent or a terrorist.

“We strongly condemn any and all forms of baseless accusations and red-tagging among our constituents, faculty and students alike. They deserve our respect, not harassment,” she added.

Asia Pacific Report republishes Rappler articles with permission.

To quote from the news feature: “In a tweet, UP Professor Danilo Arao said it was the 1989 abduction of Donato Continente, former staffer of campus paper Philippine Collegian, that led to the signing.” https://t.co/kkP7nVOSAJ

— Danilo Arao (@dannyarao) January 19, 2021

Andreas Harsono: Indonesia’s harmful restrictions on foreign journalists, academics

Pacific Media Watch — Thu, 27 Aug 2020 20:57:54 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Andreas Harsono in Jakarta

Kate Walton wanted to cook klepon and she tweeted it – showing a bag of flour, pandan, coconut etc. – and Indonesians on social media were buzzing!

A white Australian woman in Canberra could make klepon, the pandan-flavored rice balls filled with palm sugar and coated in grated coconut.

She tweeted a photo of her father: “Dad was very impatient for the klepon to cook.”

Walton, 32, speaks fluent Indonesian, writes about Indonesia, has many Indonesian friends, and loves Indonesian food and culture.

She was banned from entering the country she had lived in since 2011 when immigration officials deported her in June 2019 after she was seen taking photos of a street protest in Jakarta.

She left behind her partner and their cats in Jakarta. Walton is not the only one. Several Australian journalists and academics are on the Indonesian government’s visa blacklist, meaning that their decades of research and linguistic skills go to waste.

Immigration officials stopped two others last year. One is Ross Tapsell, an expert on Indonesian media at the Australian National University. And the other is Dave McRae from Melbourne University, a writer on sectarian violence around Lake Poso, Sulawesi.

Social-cultural visas
They traveled to Indonesia on social-cultural visas, rather than on the specific visas required for academic research.

Immigration officials deported a US environmentalist, Phil Jacobson, from Indonesia earlier this year over a visa violation. The authorities detained him for three nights in January 2020, seized his passport, and accused him of using a business visa to work as a journalist in Palangka Raya.

Following the involvement of the US embassy, Jacobson was deported back to the US.

US-based environmental journalist Philip Jacobson poses with his legal advisers from the Palangkaraya Legal Aid Institute on January 31, the day he was released from immigration detention and deported to the US. Image: Jakarta Post/LBH Palangkaraya

In 2014, the Indonesian authorities convicted Valentine Bourrat and Thomas Dandois, two French journalists from Arte TV, of journalism activities without the appropriate visa and jailed them for 2.5 months in Jayapura, Papua.

In 2015, Rebecca Prosser and Neil Bonner, two British journalists from National Geographic, were jailed for three months on Batam Island, near Singapore, on similar charges.

An anthology by the news agency Antara purporting to provide evidence against French journalist Valentine Bourrat. It was false – she was a journalist for Arte TV and was released after being imprisoned for more 2.5 months in Jayapura over alleged visa violations. Image: AH

Every country is entitled to protect its borders, enact immigration laws and regulate visas. But Indonesia’s 2011 Immigration Law is especially harsh.

Any foreigner “who deliberately misuses or engages in activities inconsistent with the intent and purpose of the residence provided to him” can be punished with up to five years in prison and fined up to Rp 500 million (US$35,000).

Another page from the anthology by Antara. Image: AH

The law also criminalises “every person who orders or provides an opportunity for foreigners to abuse or engage in activities inconsistent with the intent or purpose of the residence provided to him”.

Meanwhile, getting a journalist visa or a research visa for Indonesia is very complicated.

18 units in ‘clearing house’
Journalists’ applications go to the Foreign Ministry, which will take it to a “clearing house” involving 18 working units from 12 government bodies.

The bodies include the Religious Affairs Ministry, the State Secretariat (the Bureau for International Technical Cooperation), the Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry, the National Police, the Communication and Information Ministry, the Home Ministry, the Law and Human Rights Ministry with two participating units (Immigration and Trafficking of Migrants), the State Intelligence Agency, the Strategic Intelligence Agency and the Coordinating Political Legal and Security Affairs Ministry.

The clearing house serves as a strict gatekeeper, often denying applications outright or simply failing to approve them, placing journalists in a bureaucratic limbo.

At times the process has operated as a de facto ban on foreign journalists. Sensitive subjects that delay or deny applications include Papua, religious freedom, environmental sustainability and LGBT rights.

The clearing house system means any one ministry or bureau has veto power, which generally means that the most media-adverse department carries the day. Foreign researchers also have to go through a rigorous vetting process to get a research permit and then a visa.

It involves a clearing house at the Research and Technology and Higher Education Ministry with representatives from intelligence and security agencies.

The permit process seems to be even stricter now with the 2019 Science and Technology Law, which contains draconian criminal sanctions. The effect of the new law will be to discourage foreign researchers from coming to Indonesia, which would be detrimental to scientific advancement and international collaboration.

Extra sensitive in Papua
In places such as Kalimantan or Papua, officials are extra sensitive when seeing foreigners in their cities. In 2016, when Kate Walton was running a training programme in Timika, Papua, for an international development agency, she was detained and questioned for about five hours, despite having a visa that specified she could work in Papua.

She told me that the immigration officials thought she was “doing research illegally”.

In 2018, immigration and military officials detained and questioned a BBC correspondent, Rebecca Henschke, for 17 hours in Timika even though she had a journalist visa and a travel permit to be in Papua. Exhausted, she and her BBC crew abandoned their reporting plan.

I know Kate Walton, Phil Jacobson and other scholars and journalists well. They may have revealed uncomfortable truths about Indonesia but they also love this country very much.

We need people who will speak the truth. The health of a democracy depends on the quality of its journalism – local, national and international media – and its openness to academic research.

The Indonesian government should reform its laws to simplify the process for journalists and researchers to enter the country.

And in the interim, President Joko Widodo should encourage government officials to allow entry to journalists and academics, even those who have something critical to say about the country.

Andreas Harsono works for Human Rights Watch. He is a founding member of the Alliance of Independent Journalists, also sits on the board of the American Indonesian Exchange Foundation, the binational Fulbright Commission for Indonesia. This article was originally published in thejakartapost.com and is republished by the Pacific Media Centre’s Pacific Media Watch project with the permission of the author.

USP saga lesson for Pacific future: No more looking the other way?

APR editor — Thu, 25 Jun 2020 21:11:53 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Biman Chand Prasad in Suva

The recent University of the South Pacific (USP) Council meeting to address governance issues resulting in the reinstatement of its suspended vice-chancellor may have opened a pathway for political will among leaders and politicians of forum member countries to push for better governance in regional institutions.

It may have also put the spotlight on our two developed forum members, Australia and New Zealand.

This is not the first time that USP or other regional institutions have had problems with governance, but in most instances, such problems became “water under the bridge” after the quiet exit of those involved—mostly due to political reasons and political connections.

At times, international aid donors and partner countries, without the knowledge or consent of their taxpayers, look the other way when it comes to governance issues.

This attitude could be attributed to political expediency, at least in part. But overlooking bad governance only encourages such behaviour in the future, and what the USP saga shows is that we need a change of attitude.

Unless we demand high standards, and adopt zero tolerance for graft and abuse, we only embolden the perpetrators.

In some instances, not only are the perpetrators allowed to carry on in their positions but are rewarded with other high-ranking jobs as well. Instead of penalising perpetrators, the system rewards them.

Forensic investigation
In this recent USP case, a forensic investigation by an international accounting firm, the BDO New Zealand report, uncovered strong evidence of favouritism and nepotism.

USP Council members ought to be congratulated for taking the matter head on.

The statement by Fiji’s Minister for Education, Heritage and Arts, Rosy Akbar, affirming the USP Council’s independence is timely given the perception of Fiji’s interference in USP’s operations under the former vice-chancellor.

Earlier, Akbar had stated that Fiji is the largest contributor to USP. But it is well known that Fiji also gains far more from USP then it contributes, both in economic terms and in making it a hub for the region.

Fiji risks losing its status as a good host of regional organisations if it meddles into the affairs of USP.

For all its recent troubles, USP is a shining example of regionalism, with far-reaching benefits for its member countries. For it to be dominated by any one country would be damaging.

Many of our leaders and politicians obtained at least their first qualification at USP. There are many (myself included) for whom their first USP degree opened the doors for further studies abroad.

Ethos of academic freedom
Numerous USP graduates did their master’s degrees and PhDs in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and elsewhere. USP’s ethos of academic freedom and its management structure are modelled on Commonwealth universities.

Due to its democratic ideals, USP is the critical conscience of the region, but this could be lost through government interference.

The USP alumni who greatly value the principles of democracy, good governance, human rights, academic freedom and media freedom agonise about the lackadaisical attitude from some regional countries, including our developed partners, about promoting democracy and the principles of good governance within USP, and more broadly in the region.

Whether this attitude will change with the USP Council’s recent decision, or whether the usual “water under the bridge” attitude will prevail, remains to be seen.

The bottom line is that USP has a crucial role in regional development. This includes producing leaders who can speak out fearlessly, and who can come up with innovative solutions to our problems.

This can be achieved through open discussions and active debate, including criticism, not through silence and passivity due to fear and intimidation. Universities must be allowed to set standards that can be emulated by its students. This includes critical thinking.

Ultimately, the ability of the region to forge ahead in its development endeavours in a united and cooperative manner will depend on how it deals with governance. For many decades, our developed partners have poured in resources in the area of governance, but debate continues about how effective such aid has been.

Meaningful regional integration
For much deeper and meaningful regional integration, regional institutions like USP have to become proactive in upholding the principles of good governance. The ideas of a Pacific community and a Pacific Parliament may be old, but they remain relevant.

Right now, there are no binding legal mechanisms which can provide a collective, coercive force to implement standards of governance across the region. A Pacific Parliament could provide that mechanism, and USP could be at the forefront of discussions about such matters.

The USP Council meeting last week and its outcome has reignited some hope among stakeholders, including students, that our leaders can provide strong and decisive leadership when necessary.

It has also reinforced the crucial role of USP as an independent regional organisation that should be free of political interference.

Dr Biman Prasad is a former professor of economics and dean of the Faculty of Business and Economics at the University of the South Pacific. He is an adjunct professor at the James Cook University and Punjabi University, and is currently member of Parliament and leader of the National Federation Party in Fiji. This article was first published on DevPolicy Blog and is republished with the permission of the author.

Fiji police question USP librarian as crackdown on criticism grows

Pacific Media Watch — Mon, 15 Jun 2020 23:42:32 +0000

Pacific Media Watch

Fiji police today questioned two University of the South Pacific staff over the “solidarity” rallies for the vice-chancellor last week at the Laucala campus in Suva.

The police interviewed chief librarian Dr Elizabeth Reade Fong this morning for about an hour and then later questioned general-secretary Ilima Finiasi of USP’s staff union at police CID headquarters in Toorak.

Dr Reade said she was questioned about last week’s rallies, reports FBC News. Both USP staff presented themselves at the Toorak headquarters.

Police Commissioner Brigadier-General Sitiveni Qiliho had earlier said the police were looking into possible breaches of covid-19 restrictions by those who had been protesting at the Laucala campus.

For the past week, there have been many “solidarity” gatherings for Professor Ahluwalia across the Pacific at USP campuses and centres.

Fiji Village reports Dr Reade has been a staff representative speaking out against Professor Ahluwalia’s suspension pending investigations.

She was also part of the group of staff and students that had gathered at USP in support of Professor Ahluwalia last Monday.

Dr Reade was also interviewed on Mai TV’s Simpson @ Eight programme about the future of the university.

The Fiji Times reports staff union general-secretary Ilima Finiasi was questioned this afternoon.

Police spokesperson Ana Naisoro confirmed Finiasi was being questioned over allegations of breaching national covid-19 restrictions.

Simpson @ Eight interview on the crisis at USP

Ms Elizabeth Fong (USP librarian) has been called to the CID office in Toorak for questioning. Staff intimidation continues. pic.twitter.com/IpYEP4LD2D

— Rirou (@riroukalvaka) June 15, 2020

USP staff union general-secretary Ilima Finiasi (in red checked shirt) in Toorak today … questioned by police about the campus rallies in support of Professor Pal Ahluwalia. Image: Luke Rawalai/Fiji Times

Albert Schram: University governance, academic freedom and institutional autonomy in the Pacific

APR editor — Wed, 10 Jun 2020 09:03:39 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Albert Schram

This article attempts to put the current governance crisis at the Fiji-based University of the South Pacific (USP), one of only two regional universities in the world, in a broader regional perspective. If Pacific regional integration and coordination means anything, then this would be a good moment to demonstrate it values academic freedom and institutional autonomy and good governance at the regions’ universities. The author, former vice-chancellor of the University of Technology in Papua New Guinea, revisits a study he did in 2014 about the PNG university system published in USP’s Journal of Pacific Studies [Schram, 2014].

During the last weeks, after reports emerged about gross mismanagement and breaches of the rules of the university at USP under the former administration, this week the Executive Committee of the University Council decided to suspend the current vice-chancellor for alleged “misconduct and breach of rules and procedures”, despite all the evidence pointed in the opposite direction of the former administration and some council members.

The current vice-chancellor, Professor Pal Ahluwalia, is a reputable academic with an impressive track record as a scholar, as well as an executive experience as deputy vice-chancellor at one of the better universities in the United Kingdom. During his long and distinguished career, he developed specific technical expertise in innovation and research policies which are highly needed in the region.

First principles of university governance
Although there are many different university governance systems for universities, it is generally agreed that academic freedom and a degree of autonomy, like a free and independent press, are essential for a democracy to function properly. There are two channels in which dirty politics, special or personal interests can seep into the texture of universities: one way is by political parties using student politics, and the other way is through the university councils. Often we see a bit of both.

University autonomy is not absolute and has several dimensions, which is why the European University Association, for example, publishes an annual scoreboard on university autonomy.

Organisations like Scholars at Risk monitor threats to individual scholars and academic freedom. In case of serious incidents various human rights reporting mechanisms are used. The price of liberty after all is eternal vigilance, as Thomas Jefferson allegedly said.

In the Pacific, the university system is usually based on the Australian system which favours strong university autonomy independence. This regularly clashes with tendencies of Pacific governments which see university as government departments and want control over all appointments and budgets.

Since universities are statutory organisations and are established by an act of parliament, governments shirk away from abolishing university autonomy de jure, rather than use a number of de facto mechanisms.

As professional international university executives, we add value by bringing our experience from world-class universities in how to get things done, how to access external funding and generate internal funding, and through our professional networks.

This type of know-how and experience is usually hardly available locally.

As vice-chancellor of the PNGUoT, for example, when I enjoyed Council’s support from 2014 to early 2017, I was able to take big strides forward in establishing good governance, effective and efficient management, while at the same time create productive partnerships with industry, mobilise international support, and push the digitalisation, accreditation and academic quality agendas.

When, however, foreign university executives are continually exposed to unwarranted attacks, often fuelled by a deadly mixture of envy, xenophobia, or fear to lose face, we cannot do our jobs. The education of the next generation of Pacific leaders suffers as a result.

The end of university autonomy in PNG
University autonomy in PNG ended during the Peter O’Neill years with the Higher Education Act 2014 which had as the only purpose for the government to gain control over the universities.

Article 109 stipulated the direct appointment of the chancellor and for the vice-chancellor made the government of PNG the appointing authority. Before this Act was gazetted I warned the then Minister of Higher Education, asking him to scrap article 109, to no avail.

As co-chair of the PNG Committee of Vice-chancellors and University Presidents, I was seriously concerned about this type of backsliding.

From 2012 to 2018 there were no less than seven Ministers of Higher Education, which did not help to create good governance.

In 2016, the students of the University of Papua New Guinea in the capital Port Moresby, and the students of the PNGUoT in Lae demanded then Prime Minister Peter O’Neill to submit himself to questioning after credible and serious allegations for corruption had been made.

Peter O’Neill flatly refused and exactly one year ago allowed police to shoot hundreds of rounds peacefully protesting students. An investigation was promised but never occurred, despite my reminder in an interview for ABC Pacific Beat.

At the PNGUoT in Lae the students’ response was immediate but quick thinking by the Metropolitan Superintendent Anthony Wagambie and our mediation, we were able to contain the situation on campus. The threat to the students and the universities was loud and clear.

The prolonged university crisis of 2016, however, resulted in the council being replaced by Peter O’Neill’s appointees and the student representative councils being suspended for an indeterminate period. After the “stolen elections” of 2017, the allegiance of university council members and staff started to shift, since they were all expecting O’Neill to stay on until the next elections in 2022.

Oddly, O’Neill was pushed out of a role in government and resigned as Prime Minister in May 2019. With his Australian friends, O’Neill who likes to boast and dream of becoming the “first Pacific billionaire”, spend most of his time in his own $55 million mansion in Sydney, or at his son’s place, a “modest” $13 million mansion in the same town, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.

When he returned to avoid being thrown out of Parliament last month, he was arrested to respond to allegations for one of the many grand corruption cases and put in a two weeks quarantine. Hopefully, the police are able to produce a proper indictment this time, which can stand up in court to get a conviction.

With O’Neill’s ousting as Prime Minister, university chancellors and council members are now no longer politically protected and feel exposed, which surely in 2021 and 2022 – an election year – will cause more political mayhem in PNG university governance.

Pacific universities case studies
PNG 2013 and 2018: PNG University of Technology (PNGUoT)

In 2013, while in exile in Australia after my first run-in with the Peter O’Neill government, I wrote an article about the importance for universities in Papua New Guinea of establishing good governance and mainstreaming implementation of concrete strategic plans using various proven methods [Schram, 2014].

Later I gave a seminar at the Australia National University where I warned that the PNG university governance reform was failing.

In 2012, I was attracted to the vice-chancellor role of the PNG University of Technology (PNGUoT) because the government had promised to modernise its governance in the wake of the Independent Review of the PNG University System (IRUS, also called the Namaliu-Garnaut Report), and make a considerable investment in the structurally underfunded PNG education system from revenue of the LNG project.

Professor Garnaut, interestingly, was later also declared persona non grata by Peter O’Neill and prevented to enter the country, like so many other foreign professionals during the disastrous O’Neill years.

The review made clear that at the PNGUoT an internationalisation and academic quality agenda had to be pursued vigorously, and the university’s reputation had to be restored with all stakeholders after the official investigation in 2013 led by the late Supreme Court judge Mark Sevua had shown a widespread practice of mismanagement of funds and breaches of due process by the University Council.

In April 2014, a new council had been appointed, and I was called back to lead the university. In 2016, my term was renewed after a performance review. Nevertheless, in 2018 the PNGUoT gave in to political pressure and the witchhunt against the foreigner started again, based on the same baseless allegations as in 2012-13 of not having a doctorate which had already been disproven by an official investigation. Madness.

For those willing to check, here is the official record of my doctorate which I proudly defended on 24 November 1994 at the renowned European University Institute in Florence (Italy), and later published with Cambridge University Press.

My doctorate is explicitly recognised in all EU member states, the USA and Costa Rica.

During the PNGUoT crisis in 2013 as well as in 2018, the support in my regard of Scholars at Risk in New York and the academics at Australian National University, and several journalists knowledgeable about PNG affairs was unfaltering, and I am grateful for that.

Now that in PNG Peter O’Neill has finally been arrested and apparently finally needs to answer the serious and credible allegations, it seems there may be another opportunity for university reform.

His government created fantastic levels of corruption, and the non-resource growth of the economy diminished year upon year between 2012 and 2017.

Each year, the PNG government in order to stay afloat borrowed at unfavourable conditions, massively increasing public debt, and bringing the country close to bankruptcy and threatening debt default.

Needless to say, the promised additional university investment never materialised, and I could only use internal savings to make necessary investments. The PNG Australia relationship meanwhile had been poisoned by the Manus Refugee Camp, where asylum seekers were held unlawfully for years.

PNG 2018: University of Natural Resources and the Environment (UNRE)
In an effort to modernise university leadership in PNG, in 2015 the British professor John Warren was appointed as vice-chancellor of UNRE. VC Warren and I immediately coordinated our strategies in line with the declared government policy following the IRUS (Namaliu/Garnaut) report.

As co-chair of the PNG VC Committee, I attended their graduations and met all their council members.

After working with council to establish accountability and governance processes, we vigorously worked on an academic quality and internationalisation agenda. The advice of other Vice-Chancellors in the Pacific region and Australia to first establish proper financial management, and balance the budget was valuable.

In fact, the savings obtained by stopping wastage, and establishing proper financial control could immediately be invested in improving the learning and working environment on campus, something that both PNGUoT and UNRE desperately needed.

At UNRE the challenge to establish reliable broadband internet remained great, which seriously affected their operations and the ability to attract and retain faculty members.

VC Warren worked with the Academic Board (Senate) and the University Council to establish proper appointment and promotion procedures for academics, as well as robust assessment or exam policies. At this point, VC Warren was attacked, even physically, by members of the AB who felt embarrassed they could not explain how grades were produced.

They went immediately over the head of council and started to spread lies and rumours among members of the Peter O’Neill government, which gullible as they were, were taken for true. As a result, Peter O’Neill decided to appoint a new chancellor, who however escalated the attacks on VC Warren.

Things quickly got really nasty and dangerous.

At this point, the pressure on foreign vice-chancellors in the country mounted to dance to the tunes of the O’Neill regime. First, in April 2018 I was pushed out and despite reaching an agreement with council, I was arrested when trying to return home at Jackson’s International Airport in Port Moresby.

The police which presented no evidence and was acting directly on orders of Peter O’Neill through the ousted Pro-Chancellor Ralph Saulep, managed to keep me hostage unlawfully retaining my passport for one month, after which a judge in the National Court granted me permission to go home.

The whole sad episode was described on ANU’s Development Policy blog, and several articles in The Times Higher Education (1 and 2) and The Australian (1 and 2) and other international press in Italy and the UK, thus tarnishing the reputation of the country and its universities.

Less than one month later the other foreign vice-chancellor, John Warren, was threatened and had to flee for his life.

At the end of 2017, University Council members had shifted their alliance after O’Neill successfully stole the 2017 elections, with full support from the Australian government at the time.

Australian Minister of Foreign Affairs Julie Bishop, for instance, declared the 2017 “successful” before they were even finished, and while serious elections violence was ongoing in several highland provinces.

Fiji 2020: The University of the South Pacific (USP)
The crisis situation at USP is still ongoing, and I know the political background and personalities more superficially. As co-chair of the Pacific Islands University Network, which we set up in 2012, I visited USP regularly which hosted the secretariat of the network.

When he took over last year, vice-chancellor Professor Pal Ahluwalia asked council to be consulted over senior appointments, so as to be able to appoint his own independent executive team. He was denied this common courtesy.

Subsequently, he reported to council about lack of accountability and various breaches of university rules involving the appointment or renewal of various university administrators. This seems to have set off the current crisis with the Executive Committee (EC) of council suspending him for supposed misconduct without, however, having any primary evidence.

Rather, all evidence presented points to mismanagement by members of the previous administration and current council.

In his report to the Executive Committe, VC Pal writes the following:

“EC receives this report and takes urgent action both internally and externally. It is incumbent upon USP to be critically aware of its fiduciary and legal duties and responsibilities, especially in regards to donors and authorities that demand transparent and accountable management in the disbursement of public funds. It is further recommended that EC take corrective actions with the highest priority accorded to these matters.”

He then describes a long list of irregular appointments, which in some cases led to excessive expenses, and in all cases have constrained his ability to lead the university effectively.

Fortunately, support for “VC Pal” is strong and solid, and we hope that this becomes clear to all the council members and they lift his suspension after the next council meeting. The episode however in a regional perspective leaves a bad taste of corruption and xenophobia. The threat is that national dirty politics capture a regional university, which then goes down in political infighting.

Let us hope it will not go any further, and VC Pal can continue his good and important work. As a regional university, for 40 percent funded by mainly New Zealand and Australia, it would be essential Australia joins New Zealand, Samoa and Nauru in their wish to put this episode behind them, and stop the baseless attacks on USP’s VC.

Making a public statement however may not be enough.

Final remarks
Since 2018, both PNG universities plunged into an ever-deepening crisis. Since the student representative councils were rendered powerless or suspended, the students’ voice was effectively silenced. Both universities are now unable to retain honest and professional staff, with the Papua New Guineans being the first to leave, followed by all expatriate faculty members with other career options, and work experience at world-class universities.

All others are desperate to leave, but often unsuccessful.

PNG universities may have a second chance if their council is renewed and the council members appointed by Peter O’Neill lose their seats. It is imperative the students’ voice and university autonomy is restored, by revoking article 109 of the 2014 Higher Education Act, which only purpose was to establish strong political control.

The University of South Pacific can well emerge stronger from the present crisis, if it is short and the commission doing the independent investigation is indeed independent and given a broad mandate.

This is what saved my position in 2013 when Judge Sevua’s team established there was nothing wrong with my appointment or actions, and rather focused its attention on the mismanagement overseen by the previous university council and management.

VC Pal Ahluwalia today indicated he would cooperate fully with the investigation, which is the right thing to do. He has no other option.

It would be important, however, the main stakeholders and in particular Australian government make their support for good governance and VC Pal is heard, before this institution too succumbs to political infighting as has happened in PNG.

References
Schram, Albert (2014). University Governance and Transparency in the PNG University System, Journal of Pacific Studies, Volume 34, pp. 77-90 (ISSN 1011-3029). Retrieved from https://www.usp.ac.fj/fileadmin/files/Institutes/jps/Volumes/Volume_34_No_1_2014/Full_Text_-_University_governance_and_transparency_in_the_PNG_higher_education_system.pdf

Albert Schram: My wrongful dismissal and malicious prosection – a warning

Tuwhera expands the PJR ‘critical inquiry’ Pacific media archive

Pacific Media Watch — Sun, 09 Feb 2020 03:37:11 +0000

A video made to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Pacific Journalism Review in 2014. Video: Sasya Wreksono/PMC

Pacific Media Watch

Tuwhera, the open access repository and publisher of Auckland University of Technology, has added 16 years of back copy editions of Pacific Journalism Review to the digital resource.

The full text articles from a further 24 editions have been added, including all the original issues published by the University of Papua New Guinea and the University of the South Pacific.

Some of the research includes the Sandline mercenary crisis in Papua New Guinea, the 10-year Bougainville conflict and the Fiji military coups.

PJR now has 964 research articles and reviews on its Tuwhera open access database – the largest single collection of Pacific media research, scholarship and analysis.

Many of the articles also feature research in Asia, Australia and New Zealand, with contributing authors and editors who are members of the Asian Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC), Asian Media and Communication Congress (ACMC), Journalism Education and Research Association of Australia (JERAA), Journalism Education Association of New Zealand (JEANZ) and Media Educators Pacific (MEP) prominent.

Writing a reflective article marking the journal’s achievements on the 20th anniversary of publication in 2014, Brisbane media educator Dr Lee Duffield wrote:

“Pacific Journalism Review since its inception has always emphasised its regional identity, adopting its own ‘Pacific’ style of discourse and inquiry.”

26th year
The journal, founded at UPNG in 1994 and now published by AUT, is in its 26th year of publication.

Earlier editions of Pacific Journalism Review from UPNG, USP and AUT. Image: PMC

All the articles added to the archives here were published prior to 2011.

Five editions were published at UPNG and four at USP while the rest of 41 editions are from AUT, beginning in 2003,.

Many global issues such as media freedom and journalist safety, media accountability systems, communication in development, conflict reporting, climate change journalism, human rights and social media, gender and indigeneity have been examined.

Welcoming the launch of PJR, Dr Margaret Obi, then head of UPNG’s South Pacific Centre for Communication and Information in Development (SPCenCIID), wrote in the first edition: “The issue that is most prevalent in PJR is that of professional ethics, responsibility and accountability by journalists and media agencies and their role in informing and being informed without fear or favour.”

Founding editor Professor David Robie, director of the Pacific Media Centre at AUT, says PJR is more than a research journal. He believes it has developed a unique character of engaged “critical inquiry”, as represented by its Frontline section encouraging journalism-as-research methodology.

“As an independent publication, PJR has given strong support to investigative journalism, socio-political journalism, political economy of the media, photojournalism and political cartooning in its almost three decades of publishing,” he adds.

Associate editor Philip Cass says that as PJR is the only journal covering journalism in the Pacific and Asia, the archives would prove to be an invaluable resource for academics and journalists.

“PJR provides a unique record of issues, viewpoints and research from academic and media practitioners,” he says.

The journal’s current editorial team is editor David Robie, associate editor Philip Cass, Frontline editor Wendy Bacon, assistant editors Khairiah Rahman and Nicole Gooch, and designer Del Abcede.

NZ university denies bowing to Chinese pressure over Tiananmen

PMC Reporter — Wed, 31 Jul 2019 02:59:11 +0000

By RNZ News

Auckland University of Technology has denied bowing to Chinese government pressure to stop one of its rooms being used for an event marking last month’s 30th anniversary of the bloody crackdown on protests in Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

The New Zealand university has confirmed it canned a reservation for the event on Monday, June 3 – a public holiday, after a meeting with China’s Vice-Consul General Xiao Yewen on the preceding Friday.

Vice-Chancellor Derek McCormack said AUT did not know the event was about the Tiananmen Square protests and it cancelled the booking only because the staff member who made it had not followed the right process, and the building would be closed for the holiday.

“If it had been an AUT event or if it had been booked through the proper channels through our hospitality services group, it would have gone ahead as the film In the Name of Confucius went ahead a little earlier, which was also something that the Chinese consulate drew to our attention and asked us to cancel which we did not,” he said.

“It needs to be done in the proper manner for all sorts of reasons, including health and safety. There are also charges that are made for rooms because of cleaning and set-up and utilities.

“These things were bypassed by the person who made the booking. In fact they did not even make the booking in their own name so it was something that was completely out of order.”

Concerns coincided
Messages obtained by Newsroom under the Official Information Act showed McCormack later wrote to the Vice-Consul General to say AUT defended its academic freedom, but in this instance their concerns and AUT’s concerns had coincided.

McCormack told RNZ News that Xiao had not threatened repercussions if AUT failed to cancel the booking.

“The Vice-Consul General pointed out that we had a good relationship with China, that we had lots of Chinese students and because of that good relationship could we help them out and cancel something they objected to.”

McCormack said the university did not know at the time what the event was about. It had been booked as a student seminar and advertised in Chinese media, not in English.

Emails show Xiao described AUT’s decision as “right and wise” and would “definitely help promote further growth of exchanges and cooperation between AUT and the General Consulate and China in general”.

‘Dubious explanation’
Tertiary Education Union national secretary Sharn Riggs said universities sometimes ran into problems with room bookings, but she was dubious about AUT’s explanation.

“Hardly seems credible, does it? That is the public position that the university is putting out, but I guess from our point of view that seems like a fairly lame reason to have cancelled the event,” she said.

Riggs said the incident highlighted universities’ reliance on tuition fees from Chinese students.

“When so many of our universities now are reliant on the fees that international students pay, and in AUT’s case it’s quite a significant chunk of their annual income, it’s inevitable that foreign governments are going to have the ability to put pressure on institutions should they want to and I think in this case that’s exactly what the Chinese government has done.”

Defending freedom of expression
Education Minister Chris Hipkins would not comment on AUT’s decision, but defended freedom of expression at universities.

He said the relationship with China was important to the government and to many tertiary institutions, but it had to be based on mutual respect.

“In New Zealand, free speech, the right to democratic process, those are very important things to New Zealanders and we have always been very clear with the Chinese government that those are things that we will always defend here in New Zealand,” Hipkins said.

The Chinese consulate in Auckland did not respond to a request for comment.

This article is published under the Pacific Media Centre’s content partnership with Radio New Zealand.

Amnesty Indonesia calls for justice over 1998 Trisakti student shootings

APR editor — Mon, 13 May 2019 06:14:58 +0000

By Devina Halim in Jakarta

Amnesty International Indonesia is calling for justice and truth from the government over the Trisakti student shooting tragedy through legal channels.

This was revealed by AI executive director Usman Hamid in response to the 21st anniversary yesterday of the Trisakti student shootings on May 12, 1998.

On that day, four students were killed when the military fired on a demonstration opposing former President Suharto at the Trisakti University campus in Grogol, West Jakarta.

The four students were Elang Mulia Lesmana, Hafidin Royan, Heri Hartanto, and Hendriawan Sie.

“First, Amnesty is again calling for the state to take responsibility for resolving the tragic student shootings at the universities of Trisakti, Atma Jaya, and at other campuses in Indonesia which took place during the early days of reformasi,” said Hamid.

Hamid said the victims and their families had the right to receive legal justice. This could be achieved by bringing the perpetrators to trial.

In addition to this, the victims also had the right to receive an explanation about the affair and other rights, Hamid said.

Right to justice, truth
“The victims have the right to obtain restoration, as far as is possible, of their lives which were destroyed, through a policy of repression by the state. The right to legal justice, truth and rehabilitation are the most important rights which the state is obliged to fulfill,” he said.

Amnesty is also calling for a resolution of the Trisakti tragedy to be included in the government’s agenda and by incoming members of the next House of Representatives following last month’s general election.

The tragedy reflects the limits on academic freedom and opinion in socio-political terms. Because of this, it is important to remember the tragedy so that the same thing does not happen again.

“The Trisakti tragedy is a tragedy of curbing academic freedom, including independent thinking on campus as well as independence to express views in socio-political life. Commemorating this tragedy is extremely important so that the state and the government do not do this again,” said Hamid.

Meanwhile according to documentation by the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras), about 681 other people were injured across various tertiary education institutions in Indonesia.

The Trisakti tragedy became a symbol and a trigger for student resistance against Suharto’s New Order regime.

Following the tragedy, student protests demanding reformasi (political reform) grew significantly and in the end forced Suharto to resign on May 21, 1998.

Background
On May 12, 1998, security forces fired into a crowd of student protesters from the Trisakti University near their campus in West Jakarta, killing four students and injuring several others.

This proved to be the spark which set-off three days of mass demonstrations and rioting in Jakarta which eventually lead to the overthrow of former president Suharto.

The then armed forces chief and Defence Minister General Wiranto, who is now the Coordinating Minister for Security, Politics and Legal Affairs, has been accused of having command responsibility for the Trisakti and other student shootings in 1998 but has never been investigated over the case.

Devina Halim is a Kompas journalist. Translated by James Balowski for Indoleft News. The original title of the article was “21 Tahun Tragedi Trisakti, Amnesty Internasional Desak Penyelesaian Kasus”.
Trisakti shootings Indonesia – Stop impunity!

Second expat vice-chancellor flees ‘for safety’ as PNG universities turn nasty

APR editor — Mon, 20 Aug 2018 00:02:41 +0000

By Keith Jackson

A letter from the former vice-chancellor of Papua New Guinea’s University of Natural Resources and Environment (UNRE) in Rabaul says senior staff urged him to leave the country for his own safety after a scurrilous attempt had been made to level trumped up criminal charges against him.

A member of UNRE staff has revealed a letter to the university’s council which explains to its members exactly why Professor John Warren left hurriedly and without formal ceremony this month, with the experience of former University of Technology vice-chancellor Dr Albert Schram fresh in his mind.

Earlier this year, there were attempts to detain Dr Schram in PNG as an act of vengeance following his identification of corrupt practices at Unitech.

Dr Schram was later able to leave the country when he realised a conspiracy against him was beginning to take shape and was able to regain his passport and return to Italy.

In his letter to the university council, Prof Warren says he hopes it will clarify the circumstances surrounding the events that led to his sudden departure which occurred after the UNRE chancellor Kenneth Sumbuk accused him of spreading rumours that he (Sumbuk) wanted to take over the university.

“On five separate occasions he mentioned the possibility of reporting me to the police over this,” Prof Warren wrote.

“Although I was aware of rumours that the chancellor wanted to be vice-chancellor, they had not been circulated by me. In fact I considered them trivial gossip.

‘Very disturbed’
“However, I was very disturbed by the chancellor’s repeated threats to report me to the police.”

At a hastily-called council meeting on July 26, Prof Warren’s authority was constantly undermined and normal protocols and procedures ignored and ridiculed by the chancellor. It seems council members themselves also failed to assist, resolve or regularise matters.

“By the end of the meeting my job had become untenable, and I submitted my resignation the following day,” Warren wrote.

Prevailed upon to remain for a transition period by PNG Higher Education Secretary Fr Jan Czuba, Prof Warren at first agreed but was then informed by senior UNRE staff that they were concerned about his safety if he remained.

The same afternoon he received news that a court order was about to be served on him and, after consulting the British High Commission and his lawyer, and with the Schram case in mind, he decided that “although the charges were ludicrous, I should leave PNG as quickly and quietly as possible”.

He added: “This I did, regrettably without being able to say goodbye to my many close friends and colleagues.

“My decision to accept the position of vice-chancellor at UNRE was not motivated by financial or career reasons,” Prof Warren said.

‘Significant reduction’
“I took a significant reduction in salary when moving to UNRE and have no ambition to work in academia following this appointment.

“I was motivated purely by a desire to help UNRE improve as an organisation, to enhance the education received by its students, and to promote the sustainable use of natural resources in PNG.”

Since his departure, angry UNRE students have been boycotting classes and demanding an explanation of the events that led to his departure.

But Prof Warren will not be coming back. “Under no circumstances will I be returning to UNRE as vice-chancellor,” he said.

In his letter to the university council, he accused it of repeatedly overturning decisions it had no authority to make.

“It is extremely poor governance for council to undermine the authority of the vice-chancellor unless there is a significant disciplinary issue,” he said.

“If you were unhappy with my performance, you should have said so and I would have been happy to step down. Instead you took over the responsibilities of the CEO.”

Making up rules
Prof Warren said council members should consider their positions.

He did not say this, but it can be observed here, that the chancellor and council should be sacked and the operations of Fr Czuba’s struggling higher education authority put under scrutiny.

However, with PNG rapidly becoming a place where people make up their own rules as the normal functioning of organisations breaks down, none of this will happen,

The prospects of PNG’s higher education system recovering and strengthening through the application of qualified, competent and dedicated leadership seem a long way off.

Keith Jackson is a retired educator, teacher, civil servant, police maker and broadcaster who lived for many years in Papua New Guinea, but who also had experience in Fiji, India, Indonesia, Maldives and the Philippines. His blog PNG Attitude was established to address a major issue – “the silence that, for too long after PNG independence in 1975, existed between Papua New Guineans and Australians.”

PNG government inquiry says UK academic’s intimidation claims don’t stack up

Albert Schram: My wrongful dismissal and malicious prosecution – a warning

APR editor — Tue, 29 May 2018 03:07:11 +0000

On his way back home from Port Moresby to Verona in Italy during a stopover in Singapore, Dr Albert Schram wrote a lengthy article on his scarifying experiences in Papua New Guinea. It provides a detailed background and analysis of what befell him when he ran foul of powerful political players. You can read here the original blog piece, from which this extensive extract is drawn – Keith Jackson of PNG Attitude

MY ARREST
Now that I have safely left Papua New Guinea, I feel free to write about what happened and was not reported in the national media.

As Vice-Chancellor (President) for the PNG University of Technology (Unitech) appointed for two terms, I worked with seven Ministers of Higher Education, and three different Chancellors.

My achievements in this period speak for themselves. Most significantly, after an independent account went over all the university accounts, we achieved an unqualified, clean audit report by the Auditor-General for the first time in over two decades, and became one of the handful of agencies with this distinction.

This has been my commitment to the Unitech community from the outset.

We completed 13 major infrastructure projects on campus, restored the reputation of the university internationally by signing 23 agreements. This allowed us to send 77 Papua New Guineans abroad for training of which 27 for doctoral programs, of a total of about 150.

Despite [an] active internationalisation and professional accreditation strategy which required our presence elsewhere, we sent over 10,000 emails per year, chaired over 60 meetings on campus per year, spent each year over eight months on campus and in country.

To be accused by former colleagues of being dishonest, lazy and incompetent is truly bizarre in the light of these facts. Might does not make right, and a lie does not become true the more you repeat it.

The five years I was on campus, however, there were four attempts to dismiss me, an almost yearly exercise. The first time was for disclosing confidential information, then for “false pretence”, then for inciting ethnic tensions, and finally again for false pretence.

This last time, after receiving an infamous catalogues of bizarre and baseless allegations, we decided we had enough, and when the council’s lawyer came with a proposal to settle the matter, I accepted this on 18 April 2018.

On 1 May 2018, while returning to the country on a tourist visa, I was detained at Jacksons airport in Port Moresby, not while attempting to exit the country as reported by the media.

The police took my passport to assure I would turn up for an interview at the police station the next day, but then refused to return it and did not charge me with any crime within 24 hours as is required. Police practices in the country have been reason for concern, as can be seen in the recent report of Human Rights Watch.

The next day, May 2, the Honorary Consul of the Netherlands, Stan Joyce, came personally to demand the return of my passport which by international law must occur within 24 hours. The police waited him out, and held on to my passport until they charged me on May 7 for “false pretence”, alleging I had presented a false doctorate with the purpose of obtaining employment in the country.

The incident has caused a stir in the international press, most notably in The Australian and in The Times Higher Education in the UK, a leading industry publication. Prof Stephen Howes, who is one of the leaders in the academic collaboration between Australia and PNG, wrote: “These developments are outrageous, damaging, and scary”. In my home town in Verona, Italy, it was even front page news.

Translated: Professor from Verona ‘captive’ in New Guinea. Image: Screenshot from L’Arena newspaper

Verification of academic credentials
Supposedly only the production of an original doctorate would prove my innocence. The verification of academic credentials, however, never rests on the production of an original, but always involves direct communication with the originating university and higher education agencies in the country. I produced a certified copy for the police which was sent directly sent to the Honorary Consul of the Netherlands [in PNG].

The current secretary of the Department of Higher Education and his predecessor went through a rigorous verification process communicating by email, by speaking to the [European] university and communicating with the professor members of the thesis committee who were present during my thesis defence. This should have put the matter to rest, but instead confusion was allowed to prevail.

Some journalists contacted these same professors, and in fact I published in 2014 one of their emails on this blog hoping that would be the last word on the issue. My book was also published by Cambridge University Press in 1997, which is based on my doctoral thesis from 1994.

I have answered all other questions raised regarding my doctorate and none of those questions prove any wrongdoing. The police however refused to acknowledge any of this evidence, although they received it.

The National Court has spoken
After the hearing in the National Court on May 22 we received the headline that we needed: “Schram allowed temporarily to leave the country”. We did not get the headline we deserved, however, which is “Schram first wrongfully dismissed and then unlawfully charged on false pretence”.

In his judgement of May 22 on the bail conditions, the judge in the National Court – the second highest court in the country – was deliberately explicit on the substantive case: there is not a shred of primary evidence suggesting I have falsified anything, while there is overwhelming evidence that in fact my doctorate is genuine.

Finally, an independent judge has said what anyone with common sense could have concluded since the complaints were made in 2012.

The judge blasted the police and the complainant Ralph Saulep, and wrote in his judgment:

“In spite of this overwhelming evidence (presented by Dr Schram) Mr Saulep continues to dispute the authenticity of the applicant’s doctorate degree. I find this ridiculous and difficult to fathom especially when neither he or the police are in receipt of evidence from the European University Institute in Florence Italy, confirming their allegations and suspicions.”

The judge continued:

“The current charge, with respect, lacks the primary evidence to prove the elements of falsity. Whether they will have such evidence by the 12th of June 2018 (the next hearing) is anyone’s guess. The reality is that they have failed to do so when the allegations were raised in 2012″….

Since 2012 when the complaint was filed by the former [Unitech] pro-chancellor Ralph Saulep the police have failed to produce any evidence, and in fact cannot do so because there is no basis for it in fact and in truth.

In a state of law it is not up to the accused to prove his innocence, but for the police to prove substantial primary evidence of a crime and proof guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

The judge regretted I had been put in a position to prove my innocence, but pragmatically accepted the situation and my commitment to proof my innocence: “The refusal by Mr Saulep and the police will now cause the appliance to use his own expense to prove his innocence.”

It stands to reason therefore the case will be thrown out at some point in time, and my innocence will be established.

All this is of course damaging for police and the complainant – former pro-chancellor Ralph Saulep, in 2012 dismissed by the Minister with former Council members for mismanagement – and the University Council, which [earlier this year] dismissed me for no valid reason. The lack of evidence had already been indicated earlier by Keith Jackson.

Since the conditions for the settlement with the Council, which included no criminal prosecution, have now been violated, I do not consider myself bound to this agreement. In any case, for justice to prevail and the people of PNG to be liberated from police abuse, I must describe the facts.

This whole case is hugely damaging for the country where human rights and the police force are already severely criticised in the recent report from Human Rights Watch in New York.

If any tourist can be arrested for not being able to prove anything about his/her identity (birth, credentials etc.) and subsequently charged on “false pretence”, and then having to incur costs and waste time to prove his/her innocence at their own expense, we must warn all tourists and visitors.

The joys
From 2014 to 2016, though I had three wonderful years when Sir Nagora Bogan, a wise Chancellor, kept the politicians out of my hair, [when we] focused all our energies on the development, and on efficient, transparent accountable management, of the University.

Despite these recent experiences of politically driven persecution, my wife and I love the wonderful people of Papua New Guinea. We did not come to PNG to get rich and worked on local salaries paid in the national currency, but we came to make a difference. Although many things we tried, failed, our records of achievements speak for themselves.

So far, I have lived in seven different countries in Latin America and Europe, but the people of Papua New Guinea are the most warm, welcoming and generous people I have had the honour of meeting. After six years, for example, we have six wonderful young men who call us father and mother, three babies named after us, and I have four new brothers, subsistence farmer or fishermen living in villages like 80 percent of the population.

In addition, we have been adopted as Chiefs (for external affairs) in Busama Village, which is arguably a greater achievement than being appointed Vice-Chancellor. This new family is not after our money, but genuinely included us in their families, and communities.

The sorrows
Regrettably, when Sir Nagora Bogan resigned as Chancellor at the end of 2016, politics crept into the university governance with a deadly combination of external meddling and toxic internal administrative politics.

In 2016, we dealt as best as we could with major shortages in funding, and a terrible student crisis instigated from outside the university.

The university crisis in 2016, which led to the students wounding and killing each other on the campus of the PNG University of Technology, and the shooting of students on the campus of the University of Papua New Guinea in Port Moresby was a direct consequence of politicians and aspiring politicians using students to fight their proxy fights before the elections in 2017.

A similar thing happened on the campuses in 2011 the year before the 2012 election, and let’s hope it does not repeat itself in 2021.

In 2017, it got worse with a battle for the control of the development rights of Uni-City on campus land, and land held by the University Development & Consulting Ltd, the commercial arm of the university now chaired by Sam Koim.

First the two Australian consultants, the urban planner and the financial consultant were pushed out and then apparently it was my turn. The transparency in the expression of interest process has now been lost, and it is rumoured that the development of this “prime real estate” will now occur with the support of Chinese government companies.

The need for truth telling
The feeling of being object of political prosecution is strangely familiar to me and my wife after my earlier experience of being deported three times from Papua New Guinea in 2013.

There is nothing quite like it. Entering a parallel world where lies are truth, and all people are blind, deaf and mute. In this world, you are completely along because there is no point in trying to have a reasonable conversation with anyone. A truly terrifying world, but the truth will set us free.

In 2013, while holding a current work visa for Papua New Guinea, I was denied entry twice on March 8 and May 9 and deported to Australia.

My deportation was done with the consent of someone at the highest level of government and, given the circumstances at the time, may actually have enhanced my personal safety considerably, or possibly even have saved my life.

While we must recognise each country has the sovereign right to deny anyone entry, there must be a process in place, and the visa must be cancelled formally.

We all have two eyes to see reality and two ears to hear what others say, but only one mouth to speak the truth. If one eyes, or one ear fails, we can still be part of the world around us and work hard to make a positive difference. When our only mouth fails, however, we are condemned to live in a world created for us by others, and unable to control anything.

Telling the truth for me is not about revenge, nor is it not about me. A world where those in leadership position are in a state of delusion and denial, and base their decision on incorrect information, the rule of law cannot possibly be upheld.

A world with no consistently applied rules is bound to descend into chaos and anarchy. As a higher education leader, such a world makes higher education unnecessary and redundant because qualification and competence do not matter, and academic credentials have no meaning.

What’s next?
As I said, my wife and I did not come to the country to get rich, but neither did we expect the financial ruin we are facing now. The legal fight with the Council for wrongful dismissal first and now the fight for my malicious prosecution by the police has drained all of our resources we needed to sustain ourselves while I am still unemployed. I missed two job interviews because of my arrest.

Our lives have been turned upside down. We seem to be the only ones to pay the price for the fight for good governance at the PNG University of Technology and for a police that upholds the rule of law. Why?

Because I gave my word to the court, I will go through the costly process of having a public notary in Italy legalise my original doctorate and send it through the appropriate diplomatic channels to the committal court in Waigani. This should clear all charges forever.

Afterwards I will claim damages for all the financial losses, opportunity costs and defamation of character I suffered. Some people will lose face, be demoted or lose their jobs, but without accountability there is no justice, and without justice there is no peace, healing and the opportunity to advance.

It is anybody’s guess what happens next. Given the series of incidents of abuse of ministerial authority and police power, and the recent publication of the Human Rights Watch report, in my view it seems a parliamentary inquiry into police abuse is warranted.

The current debacle shows that the performance of the University Council also fails to impress, and it seems time now to implement the long awaited reform and create an independent university council of no more than 13 members, rather than the current councils of 30+ members filled with political appointees.

It is too easy for the University Council to simply distance itself from my arrest, while it failed to clear me of those charges after the Sevua Investigation in 2014. In 2018, it brought these same trumped up charges based on the identical materials from 2012, and failed to see there was no evidence.

For me personally, my case should be thrown out for lack of primary evidence, and then it may not be necessary for me to return for a hearing on 12 June, if a hearing will even take place at all.

It is also likely my government will file an official protest and not allow me to travel back to PNG given the abuse of police power and the state of lawlessness this has produced in the country.

There is no limit to madness once it takes root: will I be charged for indecent exposure for having lost a few buttons on my shirt during the flight? Just saying, anything seems to go now.

Negative travel advisories for tourists from different may be issued, and universities will be unable to recruit qualified academics. Last week, for example, Unitech already lost a head of department, who is now back in the USA, and another respected academic because of what happened to me.

Like all of us academics, journalists and other knowledge workers who cannot return to the country, it makes us sad that until amends are made and the police has been restructured and under control, we will not be able to see our friends and our new and beloved family in PNG.

Selected references
Australian National University, Development Policy Blog: “The Outrageous & Unfounded Arrest of Dr. Albert Schram” (13 May 2018, Canberra, Australia)

The Australian, Tim Dodd: “PNG Vice Chancellor Albert Schram Charged with False Pretence” (16 May 2018 – Melbourne, Australia)

Times Higher Education, Chris Havergal: “Former V-C Arrested upon Return to Papua New Guinea” (16 May 2018 – London, UK)

PNG Attitude blog, Keith Jackson: “National Court Mulls Albert Schram’s Application to Leave PNG” (18 May 2018 – Noosa, Australia)

WJEC16: Journalism education in the South Pacific – the new advocacy era

APR editor — Fri, 15 Jul 2016 09:25:21 +0000

Livestreaming

For years, journalism education and training in the Pacific has relied on donor-funded short courses and expatriate media educators.

But in recent times, this has been changing with the growth of more journalism schools at both universities and technical institutes and more homegrown academically qualified staff and proliferating research programmes.

These changes have been reflected with the establishment of the new advocacy group Media Educators Pacific (MeP) chaired by Misa Vicky Lepou of the National University of Samoa (NUS).

This body has a mission to “promote and deliver the highest professional standards of training, education and research in media and journalism relevant to the Pacific and beyond”.

In a region, where the news media and journalism education have been forced to confront major hurdles such as military coups (Fiji), ethnic conflict (Solomon Islands) and two rival governments and more recently the stand-off between students and the government climaxing in the police opening fire on students on June 8 (Papua New Guinea), along with critical development issues such as climate change and resources degradation, what are the challenges ahead for teaching journalists?

Some of the issues that might be considered:

Academic freedom in a journalism context
Political pressures on journalism schools
Ethics in news media and on campus – the paradoxes?
Bias in the industry work place
Court reporting and journalism accuracy
Digital challenges for media education
Media education and censorship
Qualification and resource constraints at both TVETs and universities
Drain of quality j-graduates to NGOs because of low industry pay

Chair: David Robie, Pacific Media Centre, AUT (New Zealand)

Panelists: Shailendra Singh: University of the South Pacific (Fiji)

Misa Vicky Lepou: President of the Media Educators Pacific (MeP) , and head of journalism at the National University of Samoa (Samoa)

Emily Matasororo: University of Papua New Guinea (Port Moresby, PNG)

Charlie David Mandavah: Vanuatu Institute of Technology (Vanuatu)

Responder: Irene Manarae (University of the South Pacific)

Saturday, 9-10.30am, WG126, Auckland University of Technology

Live streaming link

Brush up on perceptions of ASEAN trade partners, envoy tells NZ

TJ Aumua — Fri, 27 May 2016 07:56:15 +0000

By TJ Aumua in Auckland

New Zealanders need to catch up with reality about the country’s trade partners in the South-East Asia region, says an ambassador.

Speaking to the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) NZ Business Council today, New Zealand Ambassador to Viet Nam Haike Manning said it was important for ASEAN members to work together to change outdated perspectives of potential business in the region.

“What I find in general is that a lot of perceptions about Viet Nam in New Zealand lags behind the reality of the country,” he told council members.

New Zealand’s Heads of Mission from ASEAN country members met at an Auckland University of Technology breakfast to update each other on recent developments.

Listen to TJ Aumua’s podcast for Pacific Media Watch.

“Yesterday I took a screenshot of an article that said, ‘Could Viet Nam become the next Silicon Valley’, and I think it’s a really interesting and provocative proposition,” Manning said.

“What we are certainly seeing is the rapid emergence in Viet Nam of a knowledge economy, we are seeing a rapid emergence of Viet Nam has a high-tech place.”

‘Academic freedom’
In an interview with Pacific Media Watch, Manning said that as part of Viet Nam’s step towards a growing knowledge economy, the country is working on establishing its very first university to have academic freedom.

“I think in Viet Nam it’s pretty well understood that the public education system cannot properly deliver all the needs for its people and that’s why we see a lot of Vietnamese students coming to New Zealand,” Manning said.

“But something’s got to happen inside the country as well in terms of supplying the public education system.”

“It’s a brave step by the Vietnamese government to give this freedom.”

The New Zealand Ambassador to the Philippines, David Strachan, also spoke at the event, saying New Zealanders needed to understand the Philippines was a great business and trading hub.

His speech also highlighted the controversy around Philippines President-elect, Rodrigo Duterte, who has become known for his hate speech and approval of increased death squads to reduce crime.

But he noted that the Philippines had been the top performing south-east Asian economy in recent years and he expected Duterte’s decisive leadership would be good for New Zealanders doing business with the country.

Could Viet Nam become the next Silicon Valley?

Repressive Indonesian acts against academic freedom hit Bandung

APR editor — Sun, 22 May 2016 21:19:40 +0000

In the absence of the Indonesian state’s assurance for freedom of expression, the nation has continuously witnessed repressive acts against academic freedom within university campuses across the country.

While it was the police who halted a number of such academic events in Yogyakarta, lately, similar repression has been observed in West Java. The only difference in the latter was that the hard-line group, the Islam Defenders Front (FPI), played the role of oppressor.

Just last Thursday, the social and political sciences department of Padjajaran University (Unpad) in Sumedang, near West Java’s capital of Bandung, decided to cancel its seminar, entitled “Marxisme sebagai Ilmu Pengetahuan” (Marxism as science) following intimidation by the FPI.

Activist Firman Ekoputra from the Rumah Kiri organisation, Unpad political scholar M. Rolip Saptamaji and Unpad political science lecturer Carolina Paskarina were initially scheduled to speak at the seminar.

It was the second repressive act in only a week by the FPI against freedom of academic expression in the province.

On May 10, the hardliners dispersed Sekolah Marx (School of Marx), an event discussing Marxism conducted by the Daunjati student press group of the Indonesian Art and Culture Institute (ISBI).

The FPI demanded Daunjati end the event, but the press group continued with proceedings until last Wednesday, albeit with compromises.

Student Council spokesperson of Unpad’s social and political sciences department Muhammad Ariq Andarmesa said the FPI had come to the university, demanding that the university cancel the seminar.

Campus powerless
“The academic affairs division of my department then asked the students to cancel the event, citing security reasons,” Ariq told The Jakarta Post in an interview on Thursday.

He also received various anonymous phone calls, including one claimed to be from police intelligence, telling Ariq to beware as tension with communists was simmering.

“This proves the campus, once heralded as an autonomous institution free from outside pressures, is powerless in dealing with threats to its academic freedom,” Ariq said.

The department head, Widya Setiabudi, said recommending the student council delay the seminar was aimed to “deal with the simmering tension”.

“We wanted to cool down the situation. In the end, we just postponed the event,” Widya said, adding that Marxism was a common subject of campus discussion, given that it was part of the social and political studies course.

However, Research, Technology and Higher Education Minister Muhammad Nasir told the Post on Thursday that Marxism was banned in all campuses in the country.

“It cannot be taught as a university subject. Every campus has to abide by the law,” Nasir said, adding that Marxism was not in line with core values that embody the “belief in God” principle, outlined in the Constitution.

Police job
The ministry’s director-general for academic and student affairs, Intan Achmad, said he was unaware that Marxism had become a subject at the university.

Meanwhile, National Police spokesman Brigadier-General Boy Rafli Amar said it was the police’s job to handle communist-related events, not the FPI’s.

“The FPI should not act as vigilantes toward any event related to communism,” Boy told the Post on Thursday.

Meanwhile, Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (ELSAM) researcher Andi Mutaqqien said Article 219 of the Criminal Code, which stipulates that advocating communism is a crime, was open to interpretation.

“Not every seminar on communism intends to advocate the ideology,” Andi said.