Do you pay attention to how those who govern our country assess any article or news story about the problems in our country? If there is a news story or article saying the economy is not doing well, you must have heard the cries of “our economy is soaring.” And if you offer criticism backed by solid figures, that same person will join you in lamenting the situation. You speak about the system in the country, and the Prime Minister, who heads the country and even boasts of having 30 MPs but cannot convene parliament because there is no quorum, says along with you that change is needed. Yet he is the one who should make it happen. Notice that those with the authority to change and improve things are generally the ones giving advice. Most of the people who say “This needs to be changed,” “We need change,” or “There should be reforms” are the very ones who should be doing what they say. This is where the skill of mismanagement immediately becomes apparent.
The people who make a great show of talking about the press’s credibility and trustworthiness, yet write commissioned articles or produce commissioned news stories—as we all know very well—are the ones truly destroying the media. That is why the news in our media is generally regarded as biased. Even if you think you have produced a very important news story or written an important article, the perception created by these people means that it is not the content of your story or article that is debated, but its bias; and unfortunately, after that, what is written or reported hardly matters. In other words, our press, too, has people skilled at mismanagement. An incident we have just experienced has shown where our media is heading. In the Nicosia Turkish Municipality elections, a party that most strongly defends press freedom bought the “banner headlines” of six or seven print newspapers. An advertisement was published there in place of a news story. This practice, which the newspapers in question supposedly adopted to make money, lays bare why the press has a problem with credibility and trustworthiness. There is no excuse that can legitimize this. I’m glad I write for a newspaper that did not sell its banner headline.
Today, as I do traditionally around this time every year, I sat down at my computer to write about how clean our seas are. For years, I have thought that writing about this would make me happy and/or that by writing it I would be fulfilling my responsibility. To be honest, I know very well, for the reasons I mentioned above, that it is a pointless and futile effort, and a piece written for the sake of writing. But, as I said, the thinking that “I’ll do my part, and let those who don’t do theirs answer for it” keeps driving me to write that article again and again. The result is a process that leads entirely to waste. For the reasons I mentioned above, writing about problems is nothing but a waste of paper and time.
Because when you write a critical article about an issue, either it does not matter at all, or the person you criticize puts you in a category, or complains about the issue too. In this respect, the managers or officials who are criticized in our country have considerable experience. They have become experts at it.
I began this article intending to write about the cleanliness of our seas, but I am not writing it in the expectation that the authorities will take it seriously; there is no doubt they will not, for the reasons I have described above.
Yet it takes real skill to make a country with a beauty that many countries can only dream of unlivable.
We, too, have plenty of people with this skill...
In the hope that we may have leaders who are not skilled at mismanagement...