Opinion

Meet Alan Morison, the man prepared to go to jail for media freedom in Thailand

Alan Morison and Chutima SidasathianAlan Morison is the editor of Phuketwan, an online news site based in Phuket, Thailand.

In this interview, Mumbrella Asia’s editor Robin Hicks talked to the 66 year-old Australian award-winning journalist who, together with his colleague Chutima Sidasathian (both pictured, right), is facing jail for allegedly defaming the Royal Thai Navy over a story he published that quoted a passage from Reuters about Rohingya immigrants.

What exactly is it about the article Phuketwan published about Rohingya immigrants that in your view the Royal Navy has a problem with?

Back in July, we summarised a Reuters special report on the Rohingya. Instead of making a telephone call to explain the problem or issuing a media statement, the Royal Thai Navy sued us five months later over a paragraph we ran word for word from Reuters. The paragraph does not even mention the captain who sued, or the Royal Thai Navy. Reuters is being sued too, say the police, but even more slowly than we are.

Did you expect the response you got from the Royal Navy when you published the article?

We’ve been covering the issue of the Rohingya boatpeople in Thailand for five years. Recently, we discovered secret jungle camps where boatpeople are brutalised before being trafficked to Malaysia. People are beaten as they make telephone calls, pleading with family members to send money. You’d have thought the Royal Thai Navy would investigate and do something to stop this. But no, the Navy is only concerned about distancing itself from what happens. It appears to be more concerned about its reputation.

You reportedly told the Bangkok Post that you are prepared to go to jail for the principle of media freedom. With a bit more time to reflect, do you stand by that statement?

If the Royal Thai Navy proceeds, my reporter colleague Chutima Sidasathian and I will not apply for bail and so we may go straight to jail to await trial for up to 84 days. This is a trumped-up charge. By not cooperating, we will be making our protest. The Royal Thai Navy appears to not understand that in a democracy,  the military does not sue the media, it makes telephone calls. Criminal defamation and the Computer Crimes Act – we’ve been sued under them both – are laws that human rights advocates all oppose. It would have been so easy to do it the democratic way. We won’t make concessions. We did nothing wrong and Reuters did nothing wrong. We’re prepared to go to jail to show how wrong the navy is and how foolish and repressive these laws are for a budding democracy.

You hail from Australia. How do you feel press freedoms in Australia compare to those in Thailand, and what are the biggest differences in how the media in these countries operate?

By comparison, the media is remarkably free in Australia. We set up Phuketwan (It means ”Sweet Phuket”) because the local English-language media did not really apply international standards. With so many tourists visiting Thailand, we figured it was time to try to explain how much better Phuket would be without corruption, with the reefs and beaches protected in an environmentally sensitive way, with safer roads and fewer drownings.

Then we discovered what was happening to the Rohingya. Six years on, they are still being processed through Thailand in secret by human traffickers, with the help of men in uniform. Mostly, the media in Thailand turns a blind eye. There is no overt censorship, but there is widespread self-censorship.

In the latest Reporters Without Borders press freedom index, Thailand actually rose a couple of places in the rankings (from 137th to 135th, just above Jordan and Zimbabwe) and is said to have a relatively free press for a Southeast Asian country. Do you feel that media freedoms in Thailand are improving, despite your own personal circumstances?

Rising two positions from 137th to 135th just about sums it up. With a range of repressive laws that can be used in criminal defamation actions by individuals to attack their enemies, Thailand is a long way from the top when it comes to a free media.

All of Southeast Asia has the Western franchise retail outlets but some of the principles of a free society are not so easy to import and apply. The Royal Thai Navy is a good organisation. They help charities, rescue tourists and protect endangered turtles.  When a good organisation starts using bad laws, you know a country has serious problems.

Next year, look for Thailand to head back to 137th or lower. Thailand will move down the trafficking index, too, until it embraces change.

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