6 Feb,Kathmandu : When the government is preparing to announce the local poll date, media experts and senior media people from Japan have insisted on the dissemination of election-related news being based on the election agenda instead of the affairs of any particular political party.
They said the NHK, a leading media in Japan, had been found paying its special attention to making people aware of electoral activities and programmes and finding how the election was fair and impartial as the organisation believed the election was for the nation and people.
“The business of any particular party is not the priority of the organisation,” shared the participants ( from Japan) of a ‘seminar for mass media on how the elections should be covered in a democratic country’ organised here today jointly by the Central Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, Tribhuvan University and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
As shared by the Japanese participants, the election code of conducts is fully followed in Japan. There is a custom that any political party is given a certain time to talk about party views and disseminate contents of the election manifesto through media on the basis of votes the party earned in the election.
They went on to say that increasing people’s interest in political affairs and election, giving much respect to the election code of conduct, broadcasting laws and inter-house rules and regulations and producing election-related feature news and other news reports being faced on facts were in the list of top priorities of the organisation.
The organisation gives space to people’s opinion, voices of political parties, business community, peasants, workers, other social organisations, religious institutions and a local government in its election-related news reports. “The organisation never runs after rumours and baseless information shared through social media while disseminating the news about election,” they added.
Professor Dr Shiva Lal Bhuysal, Dean, Faculties of Humanities and Social Sciences, TU, Prof Chiranjibi Khanal, Head of Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, JICA’s senior advisor Keiichi Hashimoto, JIA representative Jun Sakuma, Progamme –Producer from NHK Takao Kobayashi and journalists from NHK TV presented working papers on the role that media can play to make the election free and impartial.
