A protester holds a portrait of General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi during protests in July. (Shawkan / Demotix)
While the situation in Egypt is complex and unpredictable, there can be little doubt that General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and his men are in charge of a country in deep crisis. On several occasions, they have handled this crisis with violent crackdowns that have attracted widespread, international condemnation. It appears they are now looking for some outside help to polish up their image as protectors of the state.
Industry publication AdAge reported last week that Egypt’s interim military government is seeking support from western public relations companies.
“The government (…) is in talks with a handful of firms that have strong public-affairs capabilities in the U.S. and Europe, and has issued at least one global RFP out of London, according to people familiar with the matter”, the publication said.
But with PR being a quickly growing industry, and a sea of options out there, it can be difficult to even know where to start browsing. Egypt, however, is not the first country to seek the help and guidance of western PR.
We have put together a list of companies that are not strangers to working for regimes with questionable human rights records.
London-based Bell Pottinger, once described as a ‘firm synonymous with this international spin’ has worked with everyone from Bahrain to Belarus, Sri Lanka and Yemen. But a word of advice, their services don’t come cheap. In 2012 it was reported that Bahrain’s royal family have spent £7.5 million on contracts with the firm. On the other hand, whereas American PR firms have to declare their dealings with foreign governments to American authorities, such regulations do not exist in the UK.
Where is the first place people go for information on a country, if not the world’s favourite user-generated encyclopedia? With Egypt’s current Wikipedia page not necessarily painting the military government in the best light, it’s helpful to know that Washington-based company Qorvis have reportedly helped clients like Saudi Arabia polish up theirs. For people seeking more in-depth knowledge, the firm has also been known to place favorable reports regarding their clients.
Mainstream media is one of the best ways to advertise your country as the new it-holiday destination or a booming business hotspot, or even get a policy point across. A PR firm can help you do that. London-based Ketchum was credited with placing Vladimir Putin’s much read recent New York Times op-ed on Syria. Could they make a ‘23 Ways You Know You Definitely Haven’t Staged A Coup’ Buzzfeed piece a reality?
Sometimes, it can be equally important to get stories removed from the media. In that case, Dragon Associates could be an alternative. They were credited with having a critical comment piece about their clients Bahrain removed from the Guardian website, ahead of the country’s controversial Formula One Grand Prix race.
There are also options outside the US and the UK – Azerbaijan’s government has worked with Berlin-based Consultum Communications. In 2011, a prestigious gala event in celebration of the 20th anniversary of Azerbaijan’s independence was held in the German capital. Attendees included former Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher and former Economics Minister Michael Glos – both board members of Consultum.
Then again, it might be nice to go for someone with historical ties to Egypt, like the PLM Group. The joint venture between the Podesta Group and Livingston Group in 2007 signed a deal with then-president Hosni Mubarak’s government to “provide general, high-level strategic advice relative to the Egyptian image among American decision-makers.”
And if that’s not familiar enough, how about hiring a company that will come to you? British Grayling took over an office in Belarus, the country regularly labelled ‘Europe’s last dictatorship’, and in the face of public pressure refused to close it down.
As global power starts to shift both South and East, and the G20 overshadows the G8, will freedom of speech and broader human rights still receive support around the summit tables?
While the BRICS – Brazil Russia, India, China, and South Africa – range from active democracies to repressive authoritarian states, none are keen to take lectures from western countries on free speech.
And whistleblower Edward Snowden’s still unfolding NSA and GCHQ revelations are surely weakening the US and UK’s credibility in promoting rights internationally. Mass surveillance of digital communications undermines free speech online: monitored conversation is not free, as anyone from Iran or China can attest.
Nor are the democratic BRICS yet taking any international lead on free speech and other rights.
If free speech is to be actively defended in the multipolar order, both the emerging democratic powers and the older western powers must stand up, however imperfectly, for rights, at the UN, the G20 or in bilateral dialogues, and not let economic interest, security priorities, and diplomatic convenience hold sway.
Some European diplomats confidently see the EU, US and Japan as the prime defenders of free speech, while Brazil, India and South Africa are “swing” states to bring on side against China and Russia. But from digital to media freedom to transparency and corruption, the picture is more blurred.
The Snowden revelations risk seriously weakening the US’s credibility in pushing for digital freedom and an open internet against a joint Russia-China quest for top down global internet control. The geopolitics of internet governance were exposed at an international telecommunications summit in Dubai last December – Russia and China pulling almost 90 countries including Brazil and South Africa behind them in a test vote. India wobbled before joining the US, EU and Japan.
But efforts to get democratic BRICs to support an open internet may now falter. ‘Do as we say, not as we do’ is never the most convincing of arguments.
Digital freedom may retreat further if the NSA scandal prompts a more rapid fragmentation of the internet as some fear. While Iran and China already seek to segment their national internets, if the EU and others respond with moves to insulate their networks more from the US then fragmentation may gather speed.
Yet direct censorship of the internet – imposing blocks and filters – is much more common in authoritarian regimes – with China and its great firewall targeting free speech extensively in ways not seen in the multipolar democracies.
But there are some troubling trends. Both the UK and India criminalise ‘grossly offensive’ comment on social media – with arrests for Facebook posts and tweets in both countries . And Brazil and India often top the lists in Google’s regular transparency reports on takedown requests for online content.
On press freedom, the picture for western democracies is fairly positive: they are ahead of the democratic BRICS who are, unsurprisingly ahead of Russia then China. But it’s a varied picture – Germany and the US are substantially ahead of the UK and France, with South Africa coming in just ahead of Japan according to Reporters without Borders press freedom index – and then Brazil and India trail behind. And such indicators cannot reflect the granular reality of Obama’s prosecution of media sources, or the UK debate on statutory press regulation.
At the international level, western countries are often seen as readier to challenge individual countries’ human rights records, than India, Brazil and South Africa. Yet Brazil and India voted with the US criticising Sri Lanka’s record earlier this year while Japan abstained. And the EU and US can hesitate too in the face of economic interests not least in dealings with China.
Transparency and corruption is where western countries do best. The US, Japan, Germany, France and the UK all score fairly high up on Transparency International’s annual ranking, while Brazil and South Africa languish in the middle, India is behind China, and Russia scores even below China (and India) too. But the US and UK’s transparency record will surely be reassessed given Snowden’s leaks.
With this mixed record of the democratic powers, will we hear less about free speech and human rights in the multipolar, digital world? At least, with whatever flaws and double standards, the majority of the G20 are democracies with robust debates on free speech at home. But the revelations of mass digital surveillance now cast a long shadow.
Perhaps one more positive outcome of the US’s stumbling over mass surveillance will be if it gives India, Brazil and South Africa the confidence to speak out strongly on the international stage including holding western players more to account on free speech. If so the multipolar democracies would then have more, not less, credibility in pointing the finger at authoritarian regimes.
Madras Cafe is a Bollywood film, a fictional feature based on real events – in this case, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (Tamil Tigers) role in the assassination of former Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, on his comeback trail. (The LTTE assassinated former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991, on his comeback trail, later saying it was “a blunder”.)
I haven’t seen the film because UK cinema chains Cineworld, Odeon and Vue, won’t let me. Apparently in response to protests from the local Tamil community, Cineworld issued an anodyne statement, saying: “Our policy is to show a wide range of films for different audiences. However, following customer feedback and working with the film distributors, we have decided to not show Madras Café. We apologise for any inconvenience.”
Customer feedback? Press reports suggested that some Tamils had complained that the film was anti-Tamil. The Facebook page of the Tamil Youth Organisation UK has been full of agitation against the film, but I was curious about the basis of the chain’s decision, so I asked them what kind of feedback they had received. Was it in writing or a phone call? Had the customers giving such feedback seen the film? (How, considering that the film was being released simultaneously worldwide on 23 August?) I also asked if it was normal practice for Cineworld to see customer feedback before showing each film. I’m not sure if Cineworld had shown any of the following films, so I wanted to know if they had sought prior customer feedback from any of the communities that may have been offended by films like “Borat” (Kazakhs), “LOC Kargil,” “Gadar: A Love Story”, or “Zero Dark Thirty” (Pakistanis), “Bruno” (gay people), “Waltz With Bashir” (Israelis), or the many American films critical of US foreign policy and Vietnam war? If not, why not? A Cineworld official sent me, again, the press release about customer feedback.
True, protests in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu has also led to the film being withdrawn from most cities there. Ransacking and attacking theatres is not unusual in India. But this is Britain. I wanted to know if there had been a violent threat, and if so, did the theatre seek police protection. But we didn’t reach that far.
Have we learned nothing? A quarter century ago, Muslims in Bradford burned copies of Salman Rushdie’s novel, The Satanic Verses because the Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini declared a fatwa on the novelist. At that time, some in Britain didn’t want anything to do with the problem. Outraged by the intellectual acquiescence of some, Hanif Kureishi wrote the fine novel, The Black Album ridiculing the fundamentalists and the fair-weather free speech defenders.
At that time of The Satanic Verses protests, while some bookshops caved in to pressure, as Rushdie has noted later, many brave booksellers insisted on displaying the novel and selling it, reinforcing freedom of expression, and keeping the idea of unfettered imagination alive.
That was then. It is different now.
In 2004, when Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti wrote a play, Behzti (Dishonour) which dealt with rape and abuse in a gurdwara (the Sikh place of worship), the Birmingham Repertory stopped performances because some members of the local Sikh community threatened violence. Later, “Behzti” could have readings in London, and Bhatti even wrote another play in 2010 – “Behud” (Beyond Belief) – which examined the state of censorship and artistic freedom in Britain.
And now? Madras Cafe can’t be shown, and much of the British media has ignored the story, except industry publications. That reflects the underlying paternalism of the media towards the politics within Britain’s minorities. Like female genital mutation, which was initially considered a quaint ritual among immigrants, and forced marriage, which was confused with arranged marriages among Britain’s Asians, intolerance by young hotheads is seen as a cultural characteristic of specific immigrant groups, and being good multicultural people, we should all accept that. Rights – of equality, of expression – are seen as the privileged majority’s heirloom. Since loud individuals within a minority don’t want it, why impose “our” values on them?
But those values are universal, not western. Madras Cafe may be a terrible film – who knows? – but that should be for the viewers and audiences to decide. The aggrieved Tamils have no obligation to see it; indeed, they have the right to picket peacefully outside theatres. They also have the right to tell their story and broaden our understanding of the Sri Lankan conflict, so that the British leaders who go to the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meet in Sri Lanka in November know the kind of hosts whose hands they will shake.
The Sri Lankan story is complex, with neither the government nor the LTTE coming out looking good. The many victims of that conflict – Sinhala and Tamil alike – deserve better. Madras Cafe won’t tell that story – that was never its aim. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be shown.
Cinema chains need to rise to the challenge, and screen the film, with police protection, if necessary. Far more is at stake than a Bollywood blockbuster’s box office returns.
#DONTSPYONME Tell Europe’s leaders to stop mass surveillance #dontspyonme
Index on Censorship launches a petition calling on European Union Heads of Government to stop the US, UK and other governments from carrying out mass surveillance. We want to use public pressure to ensure Europe’s leaders put on the record their opposition to mass surveillance. They must place this issue firmly on the agenda for the next European Council Summit in October so action can be taken to stop this attack on the basic human right of free speech and privacy.
(Index on Censorship)
CHILE Chilean Director Patricio Guzmán Slams TVN Censorship
Chilean television station TVN recently broadcast the Patricio Guzmán documentary “Nostalgia de la Luz”, which takes as main scenery the Atacama desert, shows the testimony of the relatives of some victims of the Pinochet regime and their quest for finding the missing corpses of those victims.
(I Love Chile)
CHINA Wall Street Journal Hits the Great Chinese Firewall
Another major international website has hit the Great Chinese Firewall—this time it’s the Wall Street Journal’s Chinese language edition, and it’s a mystery as to why the site has been blocked.
(Epoch Times)
PAKISTAN Internet censorship in Pakistan
He is a devout Muslim. He prays five times a day. He observes fasting during the holy month of Ramazan. He recites the Holy Quran in the morning and evening. His very name is Mohammad Islam.
(The Nation)
RUSSIA 6 Human Rights Violations in Russia Where Snowden Has Asylum
To the chagrin, and the anger, of the U.S., Russia — quite likely with the direct approval of President Vladimir Putin — has granted temporary asylum to Edward Snowden. The former NSA contractor who exposed extraordinary government surveillance of metadata for cell phone calls and online communication has spent over a month in the transit area of Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport after leaving Hong Kong, where he had first gone public about the leaked files back in June.
(Care 2)
SINGAPORE Singapore Media and Censorship
After working for three years as sub-editor in a leading Singapore newspaper, Mark Fenn explains how censorship is enforced in the country
(Global Voices)
SRI LANKA Freedom of Expression
A number of fallacies are common in the blogosphere. A lot of people cannot cope with, or even understand, disagreement. Americans bloggers are fond of citing the First Amendment to the US Constitution. If someone disagrees with them, they complain that they are being silenced. Genuine disagreement is often described as “whining”.
(The Nation)
TURKEY Facebook facing accusations of censoring citizen journalism
With its mysterious management team for countries, Facebook continues to be a difficult place for people to engage in citizen journalism. The latest case is Ötekilerin Postası (The Others’ Post), whose site has been closed twice in the last month for no clear reason by Facebook management
(Hurriyet Daily News)
Why banning online porn is not the solution to society’s problem
I find it difficult not to be disturbed by the normalisation of pornography. I talk to a group of 14-year-olds and they openly boast about ‘their porn’. When I raise concerns about the pornification of life with a couple of colleagues they look at me as if to say ‘get real and just enjoy it’.
(YourCanterbury)
UNITED STATES Obama’s Downward Spiral
Four freedoms have always formed the bedrock of American liberty. The freedom of speech, the freedom of assembly, the rights to privacy and to a fair trial, largely covered in the first, fourth, and sixth Amendments. It is astonishing that a single president has so thoroughly undermined all four.
(Dissident Voice)
How We Can Balance Freedom Of Speech And The Rights Of College Athletes
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled yesterday that video game manufacturer EA Sports could not use the First Amendment to toss out a lawsuit against its use of the names, images, and likenesses of college athletes without compensation when it produced its line of NCAA football video games.
(Think Progress)
ACLU Accuses Union of “Extortion” for Using its Free Speech to Criticize It
Everyone supports free speech, until it’s free speech aimed at them. And suddenly the ACLU, an organization that is perfectly okay with turning over classified information to terrorists that can get Americans killed, draws the line at… being embarrassed in the press.
(Frontpage Mag)
Free speech doesn’t exist everywhere
Americans excel at one thing for sure: speaking their minds. Everyone has an opinion, and most are eager to share them. We live in a country where it’s not uncommon to hear criticisms of any elected official, from President Obama right on down the line.
(Yuma Sun)
As global power starts to shift both South and East, and the G20 overshadows the G8, will freedom of speech and broader human rights still receive support around the summit tables?