TORONTO – Tony Burman, managing director of Al-Jazeera’s English language channel – and former head of CBC News – was in Toronto this week to say that Canadians should be allowed to choose whether or not to get his channel in their homes.
Al-Jazeera the news organization has been a hot potato of a media outlet in the past. It’s Arabic language channels have aired some incredibly objectionable content in the past where virulently anti-Semitic viewpoints have made it to broadcast.
Because of that history and the resultant lobbying in Canada earlier this decade, the Arabic channel can’t really be offered to Canadians. While it was approved for the eligible satellite list for carriage here by the CRTC, conditions were attached: Cable and satellite companies must commit to employing Arabic-speaking censors who would monitor the channel 24/7. So of course, none do.
However, two years ago, the company – which is a public broadcaster launched in 1996 and owned by the Emir of Qatar – added an English language channel – which has proved to be a fast-growing and very popular global news channel.
It is viewed by 130 million households in over 100 countries. It has 60 news bureaus worldwide – more than CNN and the BBC combined and it gained plaudits during the recent Gaza conflict as it was the only news outlet with reporters on both sides of the battle.
Al-Jazeera English is available in Israel, in England, in the U.S. – and should be available here, said Burman in addressing a luncheon crowd in Toronto on Thursday which featured the likes of Rogers Communications vice-chair Phil Lind, haberdasher Harry Rosen and noted businessman Hal Jackman.
“It is the most diverse news service in the world,” said Burman, which features a multicultural staff (including a few Canadians, like host Avi Lewis) and offers a “global perspective,” he added. “We have no home team… We try to let the world report on itself… our goal is not to push a line or cater to a bias.”
And, conscious of the objections many have to the Arabic channel’s history, Burman pointed out that in two years of carriage in Britain – operating under regulator Ofcom’s stringent guidelines, “We have had no serious problems,” he explained.
Al-Jazeera English will soon apply to the CRTC to ask for its addition to the eligible satellite list in Canada, and is sponsored by Ethnic Channels Group, an independent broadcaster which offers a dozen third language services (Russian, Ukrainian, Greek, Tagalog and others) to carriers in Canada. After early talks, major carriers in Canada “have said they’d carry it,” explained Burman, who said he hoped the Commission would give it a reasonably quick approval so it can be available in Canada by this fall.
“Canadians should at least be given the opportunity to watch it,” he added. In the meantime, it can be viewed live on livestation.com.
Burman also kiboshed the complaint that there might be interference from above by the Qatari government by comparing it to any other pub-caster – like CBC or BBC – where there is no interference from government.
Burman has been working from Doha for nine months now and says “there has been zero communication with the government of Qatar… Journalistically, it has been an easy transition for me,” he said, noting Al-Jazeera English and the CBC are cut from the same cloth, on a “public service mission,” he said.
