Coming off World Press Freedom Day yesterday, the announcement that we have moved four places on the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) 2025 Index is reason for celebration.
The good news for Fiji is that we were placed 44 out of 180 countries in 2024 and we are now sitting on 40th place in 2025.
Now that’s worth celebrating.
It talks about us as a nation, and how we have embraced changes in the wake of 13 years of suppression.
“Until its repeal on 6 April 2023, the news media were regulated by the draconian 2010 Media Industry Development Decree,” said RSF.
“Journalists could be jailed for up to two years for violating the law’s vaguely worded provisions.”
It referred to sedition laws, which were used against The Fiji Times, and reflected on how that fuelled a climate of fear and self-censorship, especially with the threat of sentences of up to seven years in prison.
“Since the repeal of the Media Act in 2023, the Fijian Media Association has worked hard to restore independent journalism and public trust in the media,” it said.
Today we reflect on how times have changed, and how the years have turned out for the media.
Working under the former government certainly wasn’t a walk in the park.
Suggesting it was tough would be an understatement.
So this latest statistic certainly is a positive reflection of how things have changed, hopefully for the better.
The challenge we have now is to ensure we stay focused on people being able to speak their minds, and express themselves, obviously with responsibility.
We can already see and feel it anyway.
People are raising issues that affect them. They are raising issues that they can relate to and feel strongly about.
That’s the way to go. They are holding power to account. They are assisting in the governance of our nation. They are forcing change. They are forcing our leaders to sit up and take notice!
It is now for the powers that be to continue to appreciate that people have opinions that may differ from theirs. At the end of all this sits the need for improvement, and a better life here in Fiji.
As United Nations secretary general Antonio Guterres said: “Freedom for people depends on freedom of the press!”
Free and independent journalism, he said, is an essential public good.
It’s the backbone of accountability, justice, equality and human rights!
Journalists everywhere, he said, must be able to report freely and without fear or favour.
“When journalists are unable to work, we all lose!”
