RTE under estimating figures for anti war demo?

national | miscellaneous | news report Friday April 04, 2003 11:18 by hopespringseternal

Can they be held accountable for individual's mistakes..?

"Our reporters have striven, frequently in very dangerous circumstances, to present to the Irish people an objective assessment of what is happening on the ground in Iraq. "

Below are two replies I have received from emailing RTE. As always, they have being courteous and responsive to any complaints.

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this is the second reply....I can't access the archives, but he has the date wrong anyway as far as I can see....
Sent: 04 April 2003 10:05
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I have checked our library index. RTE News broadcast that 20,000 people
took part in the protest on Saturday in Dublin. You can view the report for
yourself if you have access to Real Player on your PC .

www.rte.ie/news/2003/0329

Yours sincerely

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this is the first reply....
Sent: 04 April 2003 09:49
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Dear ...

Thank you for your email. RTE has broadcast over the last three weeks hours
and hours of reportage, debate and analysis on the war in Iraq. We cannot
be held accountable for the accuracy or otherwise of the voluminous amount
of facts, opinions, surmises, analyses, etc. uttered by the hundreds of
participants in all the programmes. We have attempted to steer a balanced
course between those supporting the American intervention and those opposed
to the intervention. Our reporters have striven, frequently in very
dangerous circumstances, to present to the Irish people an objective
assessment of what is happening on the ground in Iraq. Our presenters have
tried to allow all sides participate in the debates on the issue.

If Mark Hennessy said something inaccurate in an interview and this was not
picked up by the presenter I am sorry. But I believe with the volume of
debate that has been taking place truth will win out and viewers and
listeners will receive a fair understanding of what is happening.

There is not much more that I can say.

Yours sincerely

---original complaint---

Sent: Wednesday, April 02, 2003 12:19 PM
Subject: Leaders Questions program.

> Dear sir/madam,
>
> This morning on RTE 1's Leaders Questions program journalist Mark
Hennessey
> outrageously claimed that there were only "four or five hundred" at
> Saturday's
> anti war demonstration in Dublin.
>
> I was at the demo. I was shocked
> at the discrepancy between the figure "reported" by your political pundit
> and
> that reported in Mondays edition of the Irish Times which quoted a figure
of
> 15,000.