A well needed precision. At l?express, journalists have one allegiance. Public Interest. Which is why when we deal with politicians ? those ladies and gentlemen voted for by the people, many of whom are our readers ?, we have no constraint to be obliging or indulgent to the ministers of any government. Ministers are in office for one reason. To serve public interest. When they fail to do this, it is our duty as journalists to question them. At l?express, we believe that our methods of interviewing should be adversarial. A trend in journalism the world over.

When we decide to request an interview from a minister, a public officer or anyone for that matter, the aim is not only to interrogate them, but also to counter interrogate them ? if I may use such a term. Because we are no longer prepared to be satisfied with evasive answers. Because public officers are accountable. So, to make sure there is no ambiguity in the minds of future interviewees, a request for an interview is not an occasion given to someone to aid and abet his self-promotion.

I?m afraid that?s what Social Security minister, Samioullah Lauthan, thought the aim of an interview was. When he was contacted with a request for an interview, he readily agreed. Then he thought twice and asked to be faxed a list of questions. Though not in our policy, we didn?t object to his request. A list of questions was faxed on the condition that we would still meet later to go through his answers.

But the minister did not like what he saw on the sheet of paper. So, he asks his press attaché to call us to cancel the interview. Why? ?He did not like the questions? was the laconic answer. Why? ?They made him angry.? And so he cancels the interview? ?It?s his right?, we were told.

I didn?t know whether to laugh or be angry. Maybe I should share some of the questions with the readers of l?express for whose benefit the interview was, in the first place. Is it normal that Raffick Goolfee publicly demands the resignation of a minister? The mess that his ministry made with the distribution of pension and the clumsiness with which the operation was handled. Rehabilitation of prisoners and drug addicts alike. Heroine shortage. Reaction politics as concerns the detoxification of drug abusers. His political career. Whether he thinks it normal that, as a cabinet minister, he writes in weekly Impact News about ?Shaitan? and signs ?Brother Samioullah Lauthan?.

I personally do not think any of those questions were unwarranted. But the minister thought so. We would like to remind him that he is accountable whether he likes the thought or not. And accountability does not only mean speaking on a radio station on the very important occasion of his 60th birthday. The honourable minister needs to remember this next time he decides to solicit the people?s votes. So long Sam Lauthan.