A couple of interesting blogs elsewhere on the launch of The National, Martin Newland’s new paper from Abu Dhabi.

Both comment on the difficulties of running a credible paper in the UAE where press freedom is firmly restricted.

Rob Corder at arabianbusiness.com makes the point that the current market leader, Gulf News, is not going to lose many readers until The National is able to practise bolder journalism - the sort that many UAE expats are accustomed to back home. Judging by the launch issue this is not going to be for a while.

Neil Cook, Editor of The Gulf Times in neighbouring Qatar, analyses a breaking story about a major corruption scandal at Deyaar Development, one of Dubai’s largest real estate companies, that could have made a splash for the launch issue of The National. As it turned out there was apparently no mention of it at launch, although it was followed up on subsequent days once the dust had settled. Cook writes:

“Editors in the Arab world are well versed at answering questions about press freedom and none can deny that there are varying levels of self-censorship, which one senior editorial executive in Singapore once termed, in all seriousness, ‘editorial judgement’”

It was wise of Martin not to run it. But, knowing him, it must have been very hard.

Entry Filed under: Media, Newspapers