The Minister of State for Information Affairs addressed the inaugural session of the 4th GCC Gulf Press Union’s Conference today here in Manama.
The conference agenda are teeming with discussions of common issues, future challenges facing the Arabian Gulf’s press under fierce competition of the mass media of all the various sorts: newspapers, audio-visual and electronic and under the major transformations undergone by the media and communications sector both regionally and globally especially as the emergence of novel news may sometimes be faster and more effective on public the Gulf’s opinion over the Internet, mobile phones, I-Pad and may pose more than one question on the future of printed newspaper.
The Minister explained that the information weapon (IW) has now become more hazardous than it had been any time in the past and that we are now in need of this weapon in order to support development of our countries and to defend our national gains and to novel counter regional and international challenges. She pointed out that it is the right of peoples to receive news and information from any source whatsoever and by any means whatsoever and it is the right of countries to fend themselves off against news rumors, fallacies and disinformation of the public opinion.
The Minister of Information added that compliance with the Press Professional Ethics Code and to abide by the Code of Professional Conduct have become the greatest challenges facing journalism nowadays in view of abundance of diverse conflicting and similar information, pointing out that compliance with this issue would boost the prestigious position of Gulf press corporations and ensure that they are above suspiciousness when they discuss news or events or analyze them.
The Minister said that journalists’ responsibility has become much more paramount than at any time previously in terms of supporting their governments whatsoever differences of opinion or diversity of viewpoints may be inside the one nation because the challenges today are not only economic as some people think but there are new battles being waged regionally and internationally whose fuel is the media.
The Minister pointed out that newspapers and magazines which present essays, interviews and articles are more important sources of news stories even for the audio-visual press although this has now to be reconsidered as a result of the emergence of tabloids published on the internet and social media networks. The Minister of Information cautioned newspapers to avoid hasty publishing of unconfirmed news stories to the detriment of their credibility and to the jeopardy of many a country, including the Kingdom of Bahrain which has been victimized by such hasty news publication most of which are false and misinforming to public opinion.
The Minister of Information urged not to confuse between highly professional and constructive news, articles and essays published by newspapers and magazines unlike news propagated throughout social media. In fact recipients are not sufficiently independent and may easily be drifted behind thrill more than news.
The Minister accentuated that Arabian Gulf newspapers and magazines today stand in need of revising the economic module they follow in the light of new transformations in production and news distribution modules as the media sector develops towards the concept of mergers without taking into consideration conventional categorizations of the mass media and only striving to merge themselves into a single consolidated media unit which harness text, sound, image and simultaneous interaction with the public thanks to advancement of communications technology and techniques.