A New Mandala reader in Laos has sent us this gem from the Vientiane Times
Ensuring all Lao citizens have television coverage by 2020 is a priority for Minister of Information and Culture Mounkeo Oraboun.
Speaking at a national television meeting yesterday in Vientiane , Mr Mounkeo said expanding television coverage would allow people, particularly in rural areas, to access important information. The television network signal currently covers 60 percent of the country, the majority of which comprises urban areas.
“In areas where villagers cannot access the media, especially television, people are very poor and I want all Lao households to be able to watch Lao-produced television to help fight poverty,” Mr Mounkeo said.
We will be keeping a close eye on Mr Mounkeo’s campaign.
4 responses so far ↓
1 roy // Sep 20, 2008 at 2:49 am
Yes, access to state-controlled television should indeed be included in the MDGs. But jokes aside, this sort of logic is frequently put forth by donor organisations as well as main justifications for setting up of various forms of rural connectivity (e.g. internet).
Or alternatively, the logic can be twisted into pre-existing frames, which is again also common practice in ngo-circles. Then it would go like this: ‘we have decided we are going to do this anyway (for whatever reason), we only have to justify it in relation to MDGs.’
The good thing is 2015 (or 2020) is not too far away anymore. So, soon all this MDG-business will be history. Whether this will also be the case with poverty is of course another matter.
2 Nokkie // Sep 20, 2008 at 7:29 am
I think its an excellent idea. Does more than “help fight poverty” in my opinion. Hopefully, the quality of broadcasts will be good enough so that Lao viewers will not be watching Thai tv. It would help strengthen the use of the Lao language definitely.
3 BounmeKumbung // Sep 20, 2008 at 1:24 pm
The article is an excellent example of Monkeo’s, and the editing journalist’s, words being constrained by the ‘development speak’ that they mistake for English because it is the predominant language used by the international community in Laos that the government and its newspaper are seeking to cater for.
As a finite vocabulary in their own right, the MDGs are so broad and non-committal and rather ‘good-sounding’ that it would not be hard at all to attach just about any project to them with the right wording.
There are plenty of state-building, regional-economic, and even ‘poverty related’ reasons for expanding television coverage in Laos and it is interesting that, while Monkeo does make the nationalist case for watching specifically “Lao” television in his quote, the article seems to be more about connectivity and signal coverage. Anyone who has driven through a rural area with electricity will note that one of the first things people want to buy is a satellite receiver for their television. In many cases this takes precidence over things that one might assume to be more urgent, like a good quality housing structure or a toilet.
A conversation that shreds up the language of development speak might focus on what people in rural areas actually want – and it would be surprising if they did not want to be connected and did not closely associated being ‘disconnected’ with other more materially urgent forms of poverty. But then, it always depends on who one speaks with.
4 Bak Falang // Sep 23, 2008 at 2:19 am
Another recent Vientiane Times article (Sept. 16) states that the MoIC is keen to get Lao National TV onto the Thaicom 5 satellite. This is because most Lao people with a satellite dish point it toward Thaicom to get Lao Star TV (and doubtless all that Thai entertainment content). It could be that the Lao government wants a piece of the market action, development-speak aside! Interestingly (but perhaps not surprisingly), the article said Vietnam had stepped in to give Lao National Television the satellite time for free. Although Thailand’s cultural influence is still a big issue, that is less the headline these days (look at Ananda Everingham proudly proclaiming his part-Lao heritage when “Sabaydii Luang Phrabang came out, and he is one of the most popular actors in Thai films–this is quite a big step). The big issue is how China, Vietnam, Thailand, and the international donors are jostling for influence in Laos, all for their own particular ends. The interesting issue is the Lao response to all of this–the use of “development English” being just one example.
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