MCLC: staged press conferences

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: kirk (denton.2 at osu.edu)
Subject: staged press conferences
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Source: Sinosphere blog, NYT (3/13/14):
http://sinosphere.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/03/13/for-foreign-journalists-in-b
eijing-its-all-about-asking-the-right-question/

For Foreign Journalists in Beijing, It’s All About Asking the Right
Question
By ANDREW JACOBS

Go ahead, raise your hand and wave it back and forth like an overeager
first-grader. If you think you’re going to be picked to ask China’s second
most powerful leader a question, you have another think coming.

Every March, hundreds of reporters gather in the Great Hall of the People
off Tiananmen Square in Beijing for the annual spectacle of journalists,
both domestic and foreign, pitching what sounds like back-of-the-notebook
questions to the Chinese prime minister. The news conference, which caps
the annual political gathering known as the National People’s Congress, is
carried live on television, demonstrating to the Chinese people that their
leaders, like those elsewhere in the world, are modern, wise and tough
enough to face the pesky overseas press.

Except for one thing: The event is staged, with the complicity of some of
the most respected brands in Western journalism.

On Thursday, Li Keqiang, now in his second year as prime minister, took
more than a dozen questions from reporters on subjects like housing,
pollution, bureaucratic red tape and themissing Malaysia Airlines plane.

He gesticulated with ease as he talked about China’s relations with the
United States (“Wise people will seek common interests, while the unwise
will focus on their differences.”) and the fight against official graft
(“Corruption is the natural enemy of a people’s government.”).

And unlike the somewhat ponderous, long-winded style of his predecessor,
Wen Jiabao, Mr. Li was breezy and jocular as he complimented foreign
reporters on their Chinese language abilities while making only slightly
dated references to pop culture, including a nod to the motivational
bestseller “Who Moved My Cheese?”

But unbeknownst to many people in China, all the questions had been vetted
in advance, with foreign reporters and Foreign Ministry officials having
negotiated over what topics were permissible, and then how the acceptable
questions would be phrased.

This year CNN, Reuters, CNBC, The Associated Press and The Financial Times
were among the outlets permitted to ask questions. Most of those who
covered the event agreed it was a lackluster affair, without even a nugget
of bona fide news.

According to several foreign journalists involved in the negotiations – a
process that began months ago – there were a few non-negotiables: no
questions about the stabbing attack in a train station in southwestern
China earlier this month that claimed 29 lives, no mention of the
self-immolations in Tibet and no references to Zhou Yongkang, the former
powerful head of internal security who is reportedly the focus of a
corruption inquiry.

Although the arrangement has been in place for at least a decade – much to
the consternation of the foreign press corps in Beijing – an increasing
number of reporters have been refusing to play ball, either by rejecting
the questions they have been told to ask, or by refusing to participate in
what is the only face-to-face encounter each year between a top Chinese
leader and the foreign news media.

“Sure, we’re being used, but it’s a dilemma for journalists whether to
play the game or not,” said Stephen McDonell, a reporter for the
Australian Broadcasting Corporation. “If they don’t ask a half-decent
question, there won’t be any questions at all from the foreign media,
which would look silly, although maybe the government wouldn’t mind that
so much.”

Mr. McDonell, a former president of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of
China, has been one of the more vocal critics of the Chinese government’s
efforts to manipulate its public image through what he and others describe
as “fake” reporters – foreigners employed by media outlets that masquerade
as overseas news organizations, but are entities controlled by the Chinese
Communist Party.

Earlier this week, Mr. McDonell and several other Western reporters caused
a stir at a news conference headlined by China’s central banker after the
moderator picked on a succession of people employed by party-affiliated
outlets – and ignoring members of the overseas press. When the moderator
announced it was time to call on a foreign reporter and pointed at a young
Australian woman working for Global CAMG Media Group,
<http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2014/03/11/will-the-real-foreign-report
er-please-stand-up/>a Chinese-owned company based in Melbourne, Australia,
Mr. McDonell shouted, “Can we have questions from the real foreign press?”

A cheer went up in the room, and after an awkward pause, the microphone
was passed his way.

Despite the perils of rankling Chinese officials – men and women with the
ability to delay or deny visas – an increasing number of foreign reporters
have been willing to buck the system. Last week Ming Pao, a Hong Kong
newspaper, devoted a full page to exposing the system of preapproved
questions for the news conference that opens the congress. Seth Doane, a
CBS News reporter, also took a poke at the arrangement, explaining how he
was told his would be question number eight, but that he should raise his
hand each time 
<http://www.cbsnews.com/news/china-addresses-military-spending-in-tightly-c
horeographed-national-peoples-congress-event/> to make his selection look
serendipitous.

The Foreign Ministry did not respond to a faxed question asking to explain
the question-and-answer protocol. Several foreign reporters detailed the
arrangement, but asked for anonymity because their news organizations did
not permit them to give interviews without permission.

One veteran correspondent explained how he tried in recent months to prod
the Chinese into modifying the procedure. In December, over dinner with Fu
Ying, a senior Foreign Ministry official, the correspondent was among a
dozen or so foreign reporters who pressed her to abandon the charade and
allow unscripted questions.

“I tried to explain that this choreographing of the prime minister’s news
conference was ridiculous and not up to international norms,” the reporter
said. “I guess they just aren’t ready for it.”

On Thursday, the reporter was one of the lucky few to ask a question.