The United Democratic Party (UDP) have reacted to recent articles published by the Fatu Network that the party noted as “potentially libellous” and misrepresentation of material facts that were attributed to their party or personalities of the party.
These concerns were raised in a press release by the spokesperson of the party, Almamy Fanding Taal.
Below, we reproduce verbatim, the statement from the UDP.
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The UDP notes with concern the surge in articles published as news pieces which misrepresent material facts and attributing it to the party or personalities within the party.
Our attention is particularly drawn to the Fatu Network for two recent articles that are potentially libelous as they attribute to the party leader statements that can be damaging to his name and reputation as well as the party's.
We are aware that opinion pieces express views of the author, which usually comes with a disclaimer. Opinion are different from articles presented as news by a registered entity that promises and is trained to exercise due diligence and report facts.
This has not been the case in the two headlines captioned above. The party and Secretary general calls on the GPU and Management of the newspapers to identify opinion pieces as such and engage members and media houses to present facts as news because information is what the citizenry use to make informed decisions, if such information is innaccurate or defamatory, it can be injurious to the subject and UDP will not take such attempts lightly.
The fourth estate is crucial in helping citizens base their decisions on accurate information and where that is lacking the status quo of misinformation and sensationalism remains.
Almamy F. Taal ...Spokes Person UDP
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