Lily Kuo: Chinese journalists to be tested on loyalty to Xi Jinping
Chinese journalists
will soon be required to pass a test grading their understanding of Xi Jinping
Thought, the socialist teachings espoused by the country’s leader. A notice from China’s
media regulator has been sent to more than a dozen state-owned news
organisations in Beijing over the last month. It instructs employees to prepare
to take an exam on the “study
Xi” propaganda app, launched earlier this year, in order to
have their press credential renewed.
Most believe the
regulation will soon apply to Chinese reporters across the country. Journalists
from three media organisations, two of which were outside Beijing, told the
Guardian their publications had also received informal notices to register on
the app. “From the top down to
the bottom, I don’t think anyone will be able to escape it,” said one reporter
from a broadcaster in the eastern Shandong province who said he was not
authorised to speak on the topic.
The on-site,
closed-book exam, to be administered by news organisations in early October,
will be divided into five parts, including two on Xi Jinping’s teachings on
socialism for the new era and Xi’s “important thoughts on propaganda”, according to Media
Reform, a self-published news account on WeChat. News of the test,
first reported
by the South China Morning Post and the research programme China
Media Project, comes as Chinese media face increasing restrictions.
China
is considered one of the least free countries to operate as a journalist,
ranked 177 out of 180 in 2019 by Reporters Without Borders, above Eritrea and
North Korea. While Chinese
journalists face jail time and self-censorship is common, journalists
especially from independent publications often push the envelope, investigating
cases of local or corporate corruption. To get a press credential, journalists
have previously been tested on their understanding of “Marxist journalistic
ideals.”...
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/20/chinese-journalists-to-be-tested-on-loyalty-to-xi-jinping