00:00The results are in and the Media Association of Trinidad and Tobago, Matt, has elected a new president.
00:07Speaking with TV6 by telephone, Prya Bihari, editor-in-chief of ACP News,
00:13outlined key priorities for the association as it navigates rapidly changing media landscape.
00:18We have to look at the membership of Matt. The world has changed in the last 20 years in terms of the media.
00:27So you have a lot of online publications and you have social media.
00:36So we have to determine whether the membership of Matt should be strict to be journalists.
00:43Because right now the Constitution states that you have to be a journalist,
00:47employed by a media house and earning most of your income through journalism to be a member of Matt.
00:54Bihari says modernizing the organization while protecting journalistic standards will be the central focus of the new executive.
01:02He also confirmed that Matt will be closely monitoring developments surrounding the closure of Newsday newspaper,
01:09which has raised the concerns across the media fraternity.
01:13Bihari says the new Matt executive will continue consultations with media stakeholders
01:17as it works to strengthen the industry and address urgent issues affecting journalists worldwide.
01:24One of the issues that the executive would look at is the whole issue concerning Newsday.
01:30We are very concerned that the owners of Newsday only told the staff yesterday.
01:35And we would like to ensure or we would like to find out if the staff would be properly compensated
01:44and they'd be given a proper severance packages.
01:48Newsday has begun winding up its operations in Trinidad and Tobago after 32 years of publication,
01:54marking a significant movement for local journalism.
01:56In a media release, the Media Institute of the Caribbean described the closure as a sobering development,
02:03warning it reflects deeper longstanding challenges facing traditional media across the region.
02:08The MIC pointed to declining advertising revenue, rising operational costs,
02:14and shift in audience behavior as key pressures threatening media diversity,
02:19editorial independence, and public access to reliable information.
02:23It further warned that the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence,
02:28often without regulation or compensation, is compounding those challenges.
02:34The Media Institute of the Caribbean is now calling for a region-wide conversation on new business models,
02:40diverse revenue streams, and updated regulatory frameworks to secure the future of Caribbean journalism.
02:48Charlotte Kisto, TV6 News.
02:53Charlotte Kisto, TV6 News.
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