Blame it on the media
By Biplav Gautam
(2001)

In poor countries blaming the government for societies ills is en vogue. In developed countries people tend to choose the more tactful approach of blaming the media. Either way finding someone to blame other than oneself seems to be the common trend.

In Nepal, since we are classified as a “poor nation,” blaming the government is the preferred option amongst the masses. Despite this, there is at least one sector though where the media of Nepal does need to shoulder a great deal of blame – sports.

In the competitive sporting sector, Nepal has yet to make its mark, or even a mark. Many are quick to blame the government for this. The government is blamed for everything from not building enough sporting infrastructure, to not giving top athletes jobs, to bringing too much politics into Nepal sports. Whatever it is, there is consensus that the government is not doing enough to uplift Nepali sports.

In a country where survival is the order of the day for the majority of the populace, is it really fair to chastise the government for not funding the sporting sector better?

Arguments can be made that sports brings about nationalism, gets kids off the streets and promotes good health, among many other things, but perhaps getting kids in school and providing basic primary health care should be the first items on the governments agenda before building an Olympic size stadium for a few elite athletes.

If someone wants to find one of the greatest reasons for Nepal’s lack of sporting prowess they do not have to look further than the newspaper they might be holding in their hands at the moment. Nepal’s media has continually marginalized sports and the subsequent shoddy, biased or inept reporting has resulted in a country that lacks a sporting culture.

The people who run sports in Nepal are brought-up on a diet of the local newspapers, magazines, television and radio stations. If those mediums are inept in covering sports how can we expect the people who use them as their knowledge base in sports to properly govern sports in the country?

Many sports journalists capitulate that their editors generally regard the sports section in their newspaper as filler space. If an extra advertisement comes their way, a sports article will be the first thing to get the ax. Therefore little attention has been paid to the sports section of newspapers. That in turn has resulted in other mediums not paying much attention to sports either.

Fluidity tends to be lacking in almost all sport sections. Articles all placed depending on their size and not the significance of the news. A result of a sporting event will be given, but never placed into context, as follow-up articles are not published.

Last year there was even a case where a local radio station reported that Real Madrid beat Juventus in the finals of the Champions League. The news was true, but it was two years old! The researcher putting together the sports round-up must have not caught the obvious glitch in the wire service where they got their news. Why? – probably because they knew nothing about sports.

This brings us to another major problem – many of the sports journalists in Nepal have little foundation in their field of reporting, thus the public is subjected to very poor articles.

During the 1997 South Asian Football Championships in Kathmandu, countless Nepali journalists asked star Indian footballer, Bhaichung Bhutia, if he would ever play for Nepal’s national team – not realizing that that was an impossibility given the existing FIFA statutes.

The feud within the All Nepal Football Association has once again highlighted the incompetence of some journalists.  In the beginning there were many reports about all the money Ganesh Thapa, one of the two ANFA presidents, was able to bring to Nepali football, though most of the money he did bring in was earmarked for Nepal anyway and had little to do with who was at the helm of ANFA at the time.

Consequently the general public formulated strong opinions based on these same flawed reports.

When Thapa announced that his ANFA had received the FIFA Goal Project money, no one did their homework, because the truth of the matter was that FIFA said it would only release the funds after the ANFA dispute was settled.

Except for very recently the media failed to report about FIFA regulations and how they are very clear on the issue of autonomy of a country's football association. They also never mentioned actions FIFA have taken in countries that face similar problems as Nepal.

Like in all other sectors of Nepali life, corruption and politics also play a big role in the shortcomings of the Nepali sports media. Sports officials frequently give reporters free lunches and/or allowances. Reporters who write negative articles, or sometimes even brief articles, on a sports official tend to be blacklisted by them.

The executives of the various media outlets, who many times are either threatened by or affiliated with sports officials and their respective political parties, also send edicts to the editors on what can and cannot be published.

It all adds up to a terrible mess, which basically sums-up the Nepali sports media.

In the end Nepali sports and its fans suffer.