The US media’s/bloggers’ obsession with things/issues American is an old and familiar story. Some say that the US media projected Mr George W. Bush in such a way during the initial stages of Iraq war, that even the US president was led to have faith in his own rhetoric! …And the rest is history.
The first Persian Gulf War in 1990 changed the character and complexion of the, by and large, free and fair American media to a great extent…And now the media is finding it difficult to get out of that ’embedded’ journalism mindset/syndrome. This is a subject for another post some other time.
Let me return to this present post. It never hurts to have a look at the world beyond the American shores, especially when some very distinguished persons in other countries become heads of state under very trying circumstances – for example in Timor-Leste.
And there may be something for us all to learn from such countries.
Timor-Leste… What…???
This week, with UN troops and police patrolling the streets, this tiny nation in Southeast Asia of fewer than 1 million people elected José Ramos-Horta, a Nobel peace laureate, as their President in a peaceful manner.
Ramos-Horta is the founder of East Timor’s independence movement and spent 24 years in exile after Indonesia invaded his country, earlier known as East Timor. A former journalist, fluent in five languages, he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996.
“Last May, Timor-Leste descended into violence as its police and army collapsed, prompting the hasty dispatch of a UN peacekeeping force,” reports The Economist.
“On Friday May 11th, 2007, the election commission announced that José Ramos-Horta had won a landslide victory over Francisco Guterres, a former guerrilla running under his nom-de-guerre, ‘Lu-Olo’.
“The result, with Mr Ramos-Horta getting 69% to his rival’s 31%, is a crushing defeat for Mr Guterres’s Fretilin party, the resistance movement’s political wing which has governed the country since it gained full independence five years ago.
“It will indeed be a considerable challenge to soothe the bitterness between Timor-Leste’s political factions and end the sporadic clashes between street gangs loosely associated with them. Only then will the tens of thousands who have been living miserably in refugee camps since last year’s violence feel safe to return home. Now is Mr Ramos-Horta’s chance to really earn that Nobel peace prize.”
Please click here to read more…
And for Timor-Leste’s fascinating history please click here…
For the latest BBC story about Ramos-Horta and Timor-Leste please click here…
And for an old but interesting story dating back to May 2002 when Timor-Leste became independent please click here to read the discussion…
Here is Ramos-Horta’s profile…
So Timor-Leste shows that it helps to enlist the support of the United Nations and the comity of nations when the challenges are rather huge when dealing with any country…And it is obvious which country I am referring to here!
The most important lesson is that puppets planted by foreign powers can never run a nation for long. Hence the need to search, and encourage, local leaders with credibility, and capability, to take charge.
Swaraaj Chauhan describes his two-decade-long stint as a full-time journalist as eventful, purposeful, and full of joy and excitement. In 1993 he could foresee a different work culture appearing on the horizon, and decided to devote full time to teaching journalism (also, partly, with a desire to give back to the community from where he had enriched himself so much.)
Alongside, he worked for about a year in 1993 for the US State Department’s SPAN magazine, a nearly five-decade-old art and culture monthly magazine promoting US-India relations. It gave him an excellent opportunity to learn about things American, plus the pleasure of playing tennis in the lavish American embassy compound in the heart of New Delhi.
In !995 he joined WWF-India as a full-time media and environment education consultant and worked there for five years travelling a great deal, including to Husum in Germany as a part of the international team to formulate WWF’s Eco-tourism policy.
He taught journalism to honors students in a college affiliated to the University of Delhi, as also at the prestigious Indian Institute of Mass Communication where he lectured on “Development Journalism” to mid-career journalists/Information officers from the SAARC, African, East European and Latin American countries, for eight years.
In 2004 the BBC World Service Trust (BBC WST) selected him as a Trainer/Mentor for India under a European Union project. In 2008/09 He completed another European Union-funded project for the BBC WST related to Disaster Management and media coverage in two eastern States in India — West Bengal and Orissa.
Last year, he spent a couple of months in Australia and enjoyed trekking, and also taught for a while at the University of South Australia.
Recently, he was appointed as a Member of the Board of Studies at Chitkara University in Chandigarh, a beautiful city in North India designed by the famous Swiss/French architect Le Corbusier. He also teaches undergraduate and postgraduate students there.
He loves trekking, especially in the hills, and never misses an opportunity to play a game of tennis. The Western and Indian classical music are always within his reach for instant relaxation.
And last, but not least, is his firm belief in the power of the positive thought to heal oneself and others.