ABC Director Issues Staff Call To Arms...It Should Be Nationwide
Harold Hark
3 June 2003

That rarity, a staff-elected director, one Ramona Koval, has issued a memo to ABC staff:

"It is time that we went to the Australian public and explained exactly what is at risk here. I believe the board needs to approve a campaign that tells the public about the threats to the functioning and relevance of this great public resource, and protect it from vandalism. As directors, we are bound to act in the best interests of the corporation and this means defending it against attacks.

"We have addressed the mythical issues of bias, we have entered into expensive outsourcing arrangements, we have wound down our own production to placate a hostile Government - all of these things have come to nothing. We would be irresponsible if we agreed once more to lie down and take yet another assault on our integrity and ability to deliver what we are obliged to do under the charter."

Nobody messes with Ramona Koval. Or Max Uechtritz. Others in the media are trying to placate the monsters in Canberra. Barry Cassidy, who can surely be counted on when the barricades finally go up, appears to be still unsure what he is up against. "What I hope this doesn't do is that the ABC collectively gets its back up and says 'We can do no wrong'. This is the worst position to take because we do make mistakes and we've got to be aware of that and mature enough to tackle it."

Yes, yes, Barry. In other times, these words would be wise, but March 1933 is behind us now.

This government is determined to implement the goals of the ultra right wing Institute of Public Affairs. Two years ago, IPA fellow Michael Warby warned: "If the current attempt to reform the ABC fails, if the collective wins yet again, if yet another attempt at imposing accountability by management is defeated by the ABC collective, then it must be smashed and replaced as the principal public broadcaster. That will be the only alternative left."

Alston-Goebbels recent attacks were matched for ignorance by Parliamentary Secretary for Family and Community services, Ross Cameron. According to Annabel Crabb he has proposed "the ABC be floated and sold to the people of Australia, as he said it catered only to the educated and should not be financed by the rest of the population." She quoted him as saying "Australia doesn't really need a national broadcaster."

Meanwhile former Louie the Fly lookalike, John Howard, is telling us al Qaeda has wanted to annihilate us since before September 11. Using traditional Orwellian language, he said: "New information has come to light very recently indicating that al Qaeda explored possible targets in Australia in 2000 and 2001." We will never know what this information is because like all the other "information" that routinely "comes to light" it is either fabricated or he won't tell. It doesn't matter anyway, because we don't believe a word he says.

Simultaneously, acting as Deputy Dubya, he wants to turn Australia over to the Americans for troop deployment. This is to insure that we remain safe from the terrorists he has begged to blow us to kingdom come to prove that he was right in bringing us unnecessarily to their attention. Perhaps the Yanks can bring the tanks they used in Iraq with them. One or two each in front of each state ABC headquarters should work wonders in keeping the journalists inside quiet and obsequious. As long as no one gets close to the windows, peace should prevail.

And when they come, the Marechal Petain of Australia will instruct the natives to turn out for ticker tape parades in their honour. Sidney (changed from the old "Sydney" to conform with American spelling) will be the focal point, but Melborne ("u" dropped to reflect American pronunciation) will throng with enforced adulation as well.

In any event, it will be just like it was in the best times of his life, at the end of World War II, when Little Johnny's nuts belatedly dropped and he realised he wasn't a girl after all.

Get used to it folks. We're living in the pre-fascist, post-Australia phase of our existence. And the irony is that the country that helped the world rid itself of totalitarianism in World War II is now helping to entrench it here.

Up to now Australians have not felt the pressure that Europeans and the British have been subjected to for centuries: that of elected totalitarianism from within, or invasion.

Let's hope we find that voice of freedom soon, because life on this planet is ultimately about nothing else.

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