Reporter’s Notebook: China has way to go before holding a ‘media friendly’ NPC
The annual parliamentary sessions that took place in Beijing this month have been billed as the most media-friendly government event of the year in a country where the press is tightly controlled.
The annual parliamentary sessions that took place in Beijing this month have been billed as the most media-friendly government event of the year in a country where the press is tightly controlled.
The intention may be to at least appear more open and transparent, but old habits die hard in China, it appears.
Organisers of the meeting of the National People's Congress and the nation's political advisory body used a website-based system for reporters to request interviews with delegates.
Reporters file their requests and the questions they want to ask, which are then handled by the press centre, and the delegates are notified to see if they will accept the interviews.
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It seemed like a sensible system and I hoped it would help me get access to plenty of key figures at this year's parliamentary sessions.
All was not well, however, when I was granted an interview with one delegate. He said he had not been briefed about the topics I wanted to discuss and blamed me for not sending him my list of questions.
