2004 SEAPA JOURNALISM FELLOWSHIP

The 2004 fellowship had for its theme, 'Towards an Information Society in Southeast Asia'. Nine journalist-fellows traveled to six countries within the region to learn about the different ways and levels by which the Southeast Asia's societies are evolving with new information and communication technologies (ICTs).

The reach and use of ICTs in the region's different countries is uneven. All the same, from their immersion in communities - some in far-flung jungle or mountain areas, others in major cities - the fellows saw first-hand how people are embracing new technologies even in remote villages, while even in more developed areas others continue to be deprived of basic facilities - even their right to correct information.

The fellows noted disparities in the levels of literacy, income, infrastructure, access to information and political rights, among others, because the countries in the region are in varying stages of political, social and economic development.

In Malaysia, which prides itself as one of the most developed countries in Southeast Asia, a history
of autocracy has produced a compliant media - the state's natural partner in nation-building. The country's mainstream media leaves little or no space for dissenting or independent opinion.

The task of providing a forum for independent viewpoints and voices has therefore fallen on the shoulders of the online newspaper Malaysiakini, says Indonesian fellow Agus Sudibyo of the Institute for the Study of the Free Flow of Information (ISAI) in Jakarta.

In terms of technology applications, a wide gap exists between those in the Malaysian capital, where the government has built the much-touted multimedia super-corridor, and the Kelabit people in Bario town, in the country's eastern state of Borneo, where electricity is a luxury, according to Thai fellow Piyapong Phongbhai of Chip Magazine.

To end the indigenous people's isolation, the Malaysian government, in cooperation with its Canadian counterpart, introduced an experimental "telecenter", equipped with computers and satellite-transmitted Internet connection. The project has not quite taken off because the supply of electricity to run the center depends on the availability of petrol, which often is in short supply, especially whenever air transport to bring in supply to the resource-rich state is unavailable.

Elsewhere in the region, Fellows reported encouraging developments. As Alecks Pabico of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) learns from his travel to Cambodia, no village is too far or too remote for ICTs. He says villagers and school children in the northeastern province of Ratanakiri, in the border of Vietnam, are now connected to the outside world through wireless fidelity boxes with mobile access points mounted on motorcycles that ply different routes around the province.

Irrawaddy Magazine's Kyaw Zwa Moe observes that while Khmers are open to new technologies (Internet service was first introduced in Cambodia in 1997), radio continues to be the most popular information source. It is not only cheap, it is also very accessible. He says people also prefer the radio to newspapers because the latter, which are affiliated with political parties, dish out biased reportage.

In the Philippines, Burmese fellow Khin Maung Soe says that online newspapers are gaining more and more readers, and that printed versions are starting to lose their audiences to cyber publications, which are able to offer breaking news stories in real time.

He finds it ironic, however, that journalists in general have yet to take advantage of the Internet as an information tool. Or at least he believes the Internet has yet to be fully exploited in the Philippines.

In contrast, says Kingkan Triyong of Thailand's Krungthep Thurakij, mobile phones are extremely popular and almost indispensable among Filipinos. She says that in the country dubbed as the 'SMS' (short messaging service) capital of the world, mobile phones are empowering the grassroots -- from flower growers in the north to fishermen south of the capital -- who are reaping the benefits of SMS for business.

Writing about how Muslims in southern Thailand are being served by new technologies, Grace Albasin of Freeman Mindanao in the southern Philippines, says that it is difficult to bridge the digital divide when more basic issues of poverty and governance have yet to be addressed properly and satisfactorily.

Some lessons should be learned from the Thai government's handling of information, in the case of the bird flu epidemic, according to Aprilian Hermawan of Bisnis Indonesia. He says the media were remiss in their duty to inform the public about the consequences of the disease when they failed to pursue the subject after government issued initial denials that the problem was serious.
As it turned out, the government of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra had already known about the outbreak of the H15N1 virus, which had crossed over to humans, but resorted to a cover-up allegedly to avoid mass panic. The result was more disastrous.

Indonesia had similar episode when it did not officially announce the existence of the fatal disease until poultry farms reported widespread fowl deaths.

Also in Indonesia, Vietnamese fellow Do Ngan Phuong of Quoc Te, wonders why all that people seem to know and remember about Vietnam is its war of resistance against the United States which ended almost 30 years ago - and largely through Hollywood films where American soldiers are hailed as heroes. She says Hanoi's economic strides over the past several years are hardly known.

She complains that most of the information and news about her country in Indonesia comes from western sources, failing to acknowledge the Vietnamese government's own failure in bridging the information gap, which could very well be addressed by new technologies.

What is common among the observations and insights of the fellows is that the region is home to populations eager to try and even embrace new technology to improve their lives and livelihoods.
But access to technology or connectivity alone, as many have argued, will not narrow the information and digital divide.

Governments need to lift curbs on information, where they still exist; they have to be more transparent and tolerant of opposing views and allow a free press to flourish.

FELLOWS' STORIES:

'Journalists, Journalism and Technology in Philippine Online Newspapers'
By Khun Maung Soe/Burma

'Cambodia Tuning In' and 'Beehive Fights to Keep Buzzing'
By Kyaw Zwa Moe /Burma

'Effective Communication Strategies: A Must to Prevent and Control Infectious Diseases in ASEAN'
By Aprilian Hermawan/Indonesia

Malaysiakini.com: dan Reformasi Setangah Jalan
By Agus Sudibyo/Indonesia

'New Media for an Old Kingdom' and 'Treatment Across Borders'
By Alecks Pabico/Philippines

'A Long Way to Go to Solve the Digital Divide'
By Grace Albasin/Philippines

'Mobile Technology Empowers the Grassroots in the Philippines'
By Kingkan Triyong/Thailand

'The End of the Horizon at Bario'
By Piyapong Pongbhai/Thailand

'Vietnam in the Eyes of Foreigners' and 'I Want to Spend All my Money to Understand Vietnam'
By Do Ngan Phuong/Vietnam