Age reporter accuses Vic premier of deceit, but then has second thoughts

Sunday, 06 November 2022 18:18

Age reporter accuses Vic premier of deceit, but then has second thoughts Featured

By Sam Varghese

Image by ashish choudhary from Pixabay

With the elections in Victoria due in about three weeks and the incumbent government looking very much like it will romp home, media in the state are resorting to every tactic in the book to push their barrows.

It is probably this kind of approach that led to Paul Sakkal, a political reporter for The Age, accusing the Victorian premier Daniel Andrews of making an "extraordinary and deceitful statement" when the latter issued a release about a story on the state's Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission.

Sakkal, apparently, had second thoughts about his comments, as he deleted the tweet in question. But then deleting such things from Twitter does not always ensure that they disappear, as one can see from the image below.

[Full disclosure: I worked for the website of The Age for nearly 17 years, from June 1999 until May 2016.]

I did respond to that tweet of his saying that I hoped Dan Andrews would consider legal action because that so called journalist would have had great difficulty in proving his tweet was not defamatory in court
— Heather Holcombe (@spirited62) November 5, 2022

But let me not put the cart before the horse. Sakkal's tweet came in the wake of a report he filed last week claiming Andrews had been subjected to questioning by the IBAC as part of an inquiry into suspected corrupt conduct.

He was collecting information for a follow-up, but when he sent queries to Andrews' office and a couple of others, IBAC obtained an injunction to prevent publication of the story. The Age then tried to get the injunction lifted, but failed to do so. The newspaper was clearly miffed about this, as it carried an editorial claiming that this kind of block was not in the interest of residents of the state.

The commission then suggested that there should be laws put in place to make it an offence for journalists to publish anything about its inquiries before they were made public. Andrews says he has no intention of going down this path.

On Saturday, Andrews issued a statement in which he said, "regardless of any smear, innuendo or media reporting based on anonymous sources" he would not comment on any IBAC matters apart from the commission's final reports.

And he added, "I act appropriately at all times and in all things. That is the oath I swore and I take it very seriously."

Wasn’t The Age claiming that this election would be different, that they would “focus on what Victorians want to discuss”? Effing joke!
— Cam Anstee (@camanstee) November 5, 2022

Andrews' statement was tweeted out by ABC reporter Bridget Rollason, and it was in reply to this that Sakkal's rather injudicious tweet was sent.

As I commented on an earlier occasion, The Age, the smaller of the two main papers in Victoria — the other is Rupert Murdoch's Herald Sun — has always been at pains to project itself as unbiased in its coverage, a claim it made prior to the federal election in May as well.

At the time of the federal election in May, the editor of The Age, Gay Alcorn, wrote in one of her letters to subscribers [which for some curious reason was placed behind a paywall] that the paper had not moved to the right.

This was to counter the fact that many people believe the paper — and its stablemates at Nine Entertainment, the Sydney Morning Herald and the Australian Financial Review — tend to tilt towards the right as Nine's chairman is Peter Costello, the erstwhile federal treasurer under John Howard for 11 years.

Sakkal called me as soon as he received an email I had sent, asking for his take on the issue. He said he did not wish to say anything for publication.

Perhaps The Age should exercise some restraint on reporters who tend to get emotionally involved in their reporting.

Read 9252 times

Please join our community here and become a VIP.

Subscribe to ITWIRE UPDATE Newsletter here
JOIN our iTWireTV our YouTube Community here
BACK TO LATEST NEWS here

GARTNER MARKET GUIDE FOR NDR 2022

You probably know that we are big believers in Network Detection and Response (NDR).

Did you realise that Gartner also recommends that security teams prioritise NDR solutions to enhance their detection and response?

Picking the right NDR for your team and process can sometimes be the biggest challenge.

If you want to try out a Network Detection and Response tool, why not start with the best?

Vectra Network Detection and Response is the industry's most advanced AI-driven attack defence for identifying and stopping malicious tactics in your network without noise or the need for decryption.

Download the 2022 Gartner Market Guide for Network Detection and Response (NDR) for recommendations on how Network Detection and Response solutions can expand deeper into existing on-premises networks, and new cloud environments.

DOWNLOAD NOW!

PROMOTE YOUR WEBINAR ON ITWIRE

It's all about Webinars.

Marketing budgets are now focused on Webinars combined with Lead Generation.

If you wish to promote a Webinar we recommend at least a 3 to 4 week campaign prior to your event.

The iTWire campaign will include extensive adverts on our News Site itwire.com and prominent Newsletter promotion https://itwire.com/itwire-update.html and Promotional News & Editorial. Plus a video interview of the key speaker on iTWire TV https://www.youtube.com/c/iTWireTV/videos which will be used in Promotional Posts on the iTWire Home Page.

Now we are coming out of Lockdown iTWire will be focussed to assisting with your webinars and campaigns and assistance via part payments and extended terms, a Webinar Business Booster Pack and other supportive programs. We can also create your adverts and written content plus coordinate your video interview.

We look forward to discussing your campaign goals with you. Please click the button below.

MORE INFO HERE!