Media Industry Development Authority (MIDA) chairperson Ashwin Raj has questioned the citation in a News Media Executive of the Year award that The Fiji Times Editor Fred Wesley received at the 2018 PANPA Awards in Sydney, Australia, on September 14.

The citation for the award was: “Fiji Times editor-in-chief Fred Wesley won the inaugural News Media Executive of the year award for leadership in championing press freedoms in the face of op­pressive and censorious govern­ment dictates.”

Mr Raj said “If indeed the press in Fiji was operating in an “oppres­sive and censorious” environment as has been claimed, we will not have seen the publication of dis­senting voices openly critical of Government and its policies as we see so often in the columns of The Fiji Times amongst other media without any reprisal.

“If the allusion is to the recent court case in which The Fiji Times was embroiled then it is important to remember that while the Consti­tution guarantees freedom of the press, it also places an obligation on the State to protect citizens against racial and religious vilification.”

Mr Wesley had not responded to Mr Raj’s comments when this edi­tion went to press last night.

Edited by Jonathan Bryce