| |
Home page |
Al Jazeera TV Australia - Radio National program Transcript from part of Mick O'Regan's Media Report 25 October 2001 Nadim Shehadi, an expert on Arab culture, talks with the presenter about the importance of Al-Jazeera TV. The station, backed by the Emir of Qatar, is admired by some for its independent reporting of Middle Eastern Affairs. Mick O'Regan: We start this week with the story that has effectively defined the media for the past month: the attack on America that provoked a war. A war in which Australia is increasingly involved, most recently by the decision to commit troops to the American-led action against the Taliban leadership and Osama bin Laden. For the global media there’s almost no other story. Our understanding is based on perspectives garnered by the western press as they gather in far-flung towns in Pakistan and Central Asia. But for much of the Arabic world, the news comes from a satellite TV network, al-Jazeera, based in Qatar, a small State on the Persian Gulf. So how influential is the network in explaining to a world-wide Arabic speaking audience the real significance of this war, its causes and its possible outcomes? Nadim Shehadi is Director of the Centre for Lebanese Studies in Oxford, and a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Middle Eastern Affairs. Nadim Shehadi, welcome to The Media Report. Nadim Shehadi: You’re welcome. Mick O'Regan: Nadim, how was the al-Jazeera television network originally set up? Nadim Shehadi: Well al-Jazeera was set up by Qatar, and Qatar is a very small, tiny country in the Persian Gulf, next to Saudi Arabia, and with a very special relation with Saudi Arabia, because it’s a bit like New Zealand and Australia, if you like, and it’s a very ambitious little country where quite an enlightened ruler who got the idea basically, and the opportunity came up when the Saudis put pressure on the BBC Arabic Service to close, and so all the employees which had excellent training, which had all the set up necessary, were unemployed overnight, and al-Jazeera came in, grabbed them, they had a ready team, and they took off in 1997, that’s how it was set up. So it’s this funny relationship between the Saudis and the Qatarese that’s the crux of the matter. Mick O'Regan: I’d like to come to that relationship between a very conservative country like Saudi Arabia in just a moment. But just on al-Jazeera itself, you’ve suggested in the past that it was a reaction to censorship; is that the censorship of the BBC by the Saudis that you’re speaking of? Nadim Shehadi: Yes. What happened was that the BBC was set up as a joint venture with Saudi investment, and using a Saudi Arabian satellite in Europe, and they did an interview with a Saudi dissident who was in the UK and the Saudis tried to censor this. The BBC resisted and basically decided to pull the plug out and denied them access to the satellite, and they had to close. Mick O'Regan: What sort of editorial policies does al-Jazeera have? Is it a very liberal television network given the politics of the Middle East? Nadim Shehadi: It certainly is, I mean it’s quite liberal, it’s quite open, it’s quite professional because of the BBC training. Sometimes it’s a bit too provocative, probably right so in a commercial sense because it attracts the viewers, and it’s managed to upset most countries in the region, it’s the voice of the people if you like. It’s had an effect on the whole media set-up in the region because all the rest of the channels, even the printed media, have to catch up with al-Jazeera, they can’t afford to be totally marginalised. Mick O'Regan: So to that extent, it dominates the news agenda for the Arabic speaking world? Nadim Shehadi: In the last three years, certainly, yes. Especially since the Intifada And it’s also a fact that the political agenda, because there’s something which we call in international politics in the Middle East now, the al-Jazeera effect because the population in the Gulf and in most other countries, follow day by day what’s happening in Palestine on al-Jazeera, so the politicians can’t really protect them from trusted information like this as they did before. Mick O'Regan: Well I’d like now to go back to that earlier comment you made about the relationship between the Qatar and Saudi Arabia; how is al-Jazeera regarded by a conservative Gulf State such as Saudi Arabia, and also how is it regarded by the Taliban? Nadim Shehadi: There are two things to take into account here. First that Saudi Arabia itself aimed at having a media monopoly on the region in Arabic. Saudi Arabia had a monopoly of all the newspapers, a monopoly of advertising, and was slowly gathering a monopoly on the sort of satellite media, television and all that. So the main thing is that al-Jazeera broke that monopoly, that’s a very dangerous thing for the Saudis. The second is that because of this funny love-hate relationship between the Qatarese and the Saudis, it’s even more of a challenge for the Saudis, it’s like your little brother getting one-upmanship on you. Mick O'Regan: So in that sense, they’d be regarded as upstarts by the more established Saudi media? Nadim Shehadi: Oh of course, it was, yes. Mick O'Regan: Well if I could turn now to the Taliban inside Afghanistan, I mean one of the key elements of any discussion about al-Jazeera is that it is currently the only television satellite network with a live link to Kabul, the Afghan capital, and yet it would seem contradictory that a regime such as the Taliban, with their various strictures, especially regarding technology and what you would call I suppose modern technology, that they would tolerate a satellite television network. Can you elaborate on how the Taliban either see al-Jazeera or how they use it? Nadim Shehadi: Well I can’t elaborate on how they see it, but I can elaborate on how they use it, and they use it very cleverly, and it’s probably also al-Jazeera that uses the Taliban quite cleverly, it’s an undeniable scoop. The Taliban needs a media outlet, but I think any satellite station would have broadcast these tapes if they had received them. Mick O'Regan: Do you perceive a distinct difference in the sort of coverage that al-Jazeera provides to an Arabic speaking audience around the world, to the sort of coverage that English speakers or other non-Arabic speakers are getting through agencies such as CNN? Nadim Shehadi: Yes, most definitely there is. There is a lot more sympathy and a lot less propaganda. There’s a lot more sympathy with Afghanistan, there’s opposition to the war. It airs the views of opposition to the war and its debates are probably freer than debates on CNN. Mick O'Regan: Nadim Shehadi, thank you very much for joining The Media Report here on Radio National. Nadim Shehadi: You are welcome, thank you. Mick O'Regan: Nadim Shehadi, Director of the Centre for Lebanese Studies in Oxford. From the 1st November, Australians will have the opportunity to subscribe to al-Jazeera through the Optus Pay-TV network. The man who organised the deal is Tony Ishak and he spoke to me from Cairo. Tony Ishak: Well the negotiation process was well over a year ago that we were encouraging Optus to take this Arabic channel, and it very much came into the fore about six months ago when things were very serious and they were concluded around June, July of this year. Mick O'Regan: So this is not a response to the situation that followed the attack on the World Trade Towers, these negotiations had been going on for some time when that attack occurred? Tony Ishak: Oh yes, very much so. I mean it’s just a coincidence that it happened to fall at the same time with the launch and the tragedy of September 11th. Mick O'Regan: Apart from current affairs coverage, and obvious I imagine there would be a great deal of attention paid to the current conflict in Afghanistan, but what other sorts of programming material would people receive when they watch al-Jazeera? Tony Ishak: Well I mean it’s been very much quoted that al-Jazeera is very much like the CNN of the Arabic-speaking world. I mean in The Guardian on this part of the world, in England, they were all saying it was the best news service in the world. The fact that it wasn’t in English was the greatest shame. Now it offers finance services, it shows documentaries, it even has some ABC programming translated into Arabic. Mick O'Regan: ABC Australia? Tony Ishak: Yes, absolutely. Mick O'Regan: Do you know what ABC programs are screened by al-Jazeera? Tony Ishak: I think Foreign Correspondent, they might get report from Foreign Correspondent and so on and so forth. So it’s quite a unique package of programming. Mick O'Regan: Indeed. Tony Ishak, thank you very much for taking our call. Tony Ishak: My pleasure. Mick O'Regan: Tony Ishak, Director for World Media International on the line from Cairo. |
|
Maldives Culture is an independent internet magazine of Maldivian cultural issues.
Editors and translators: friends and Michael O'Shea, Australia
We invite contributions from Maldivians and others interested in Maldives.
Contributions and comments - mc_editors@hotmail.com
