World Television Day toasts democracy around the world

Member states took into account the way threats to peace and security are put to the light of day by television and its role in sharpening the focus on major issues facing the world at any moment. Leaders of various countries could no longer say what they want as the world could see.

There are substantial economic and social issues tied to this realization, that through television the whole world witnesses what happens in a particular country or city at any time of the day, when that issue is strong enough to attract attention of major news channels. A good number of leaders were known to be irritated by this turn of events, where they can’t hide what’s going on in the streets of their countries and especially in the capital. That is where the fate of a country is played out if and when instability arises.  

In December 1996 the UN proclaimed 21 November as World Television Day to mark the date on which the first World Television Forum was held in that year. It was also the time when cable television was making its appearance, prolonged years later into its internet and eventually mobile phone expression as YouTube, and other applications of late.  All this is part of the television (seeing from afar) fraternity, which together helps or contributes to making the world a sort of global village. It translated this aphorism into reality, as visual conversation is possible by such means, and world television shows it all.

Chroniclers say that this resolution met with critics, and 11 countries abstained to the vote on the resolution; asserting that the other information related world days were adequate, like the World Press Freedom Day the World Telecommunication and Information Society Day, and the World Development Information Day. If one looks closely at these other world days, they are more about conceptualizing information and what countries tell the world they want to do. World Television Day is different, as it is about the right of viewers around the world to see what someone on the ground shows, not governments.

Television isn’t just one means of information - and an information medium to which a considerable majority of the world population has no access, as they attempted to say but by far the most direct and to that extent truthful and vivid source of taking a deep breath of reality.. That is why democrats rejected the idea that World Television Day is but a rich man's day, as digital television is making all sorts of TV channels available by the hundred. Authoritarian regimes love radios, as sound there is larger than life, but on TV leaders become humanized, frail or unconvincing, etc. We have direct experience of this here.