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foreign company that operates the Tanfull International Dateline Hotel
in Tonga owns as much as 51% of the renovated hotel.
The Tongan government had also submitted to the Legislative
Assembly the Bill for an Act to Make Provision for the regulating of

newspapers 2003. This Bill proposed to provide for a licensing system
for regulating the newspaper industry in Tonga. But it would have also
provided government unrestricted authority to shut down any newspaper

that it deemed to question its performance like the Times of Tonga does.
Section 8 of the Bill proposed to give the Minister responsible, authority
to determine standards for newspapers (with the consent of Cabinet) but
does not provide for an opportunity for input from the industry, the

reading public or civil society.
Section 9 of the Bill proposed to give the Minister absolute
discretion in granting, refusing or revoking a newspaper operator?s

licence without any mechanisms for appeal.4 The Bill also proposed that
proprietors of newspapers published outside of Tonga (such as Times of
Tonga, Islands Business, New Zealand Herald) would have to apply for

a separate licence in order to be sold in Tonga. Section 11 of the Bill
proposed to give the Minister responsible power to unilaterally declare
any newspaper published outside the Kingdom a prohibited newspaper

because it interferes in domestic politics or lacks a commitment to
honesty, fairness, independence and respect for the rights of others. In
such instances, any person found in possession of more than 12 copies
of the same issue of a prohibited offshore newspaper shall be presumed

until the contrary is proved, that he has possession of them for sale and
liable upon conviction to a fine not exceeding $10,000 or to
imprisonment up to one year.

Under section 15, purportedly no one was to be allowed to
subscribe to any offshore newspaper that had been declared prohibited
?except through a distributor who was to be authorised by the Minister?.
Contravention of this section could have resulted in a fine not exceeding

$1000 or imprisonment up to 6 months.
However, in a joint effort of the people’s representatives to
parliament and members of the prodemocracy movement seeking the

constitutionality of the amendments CJ Ward ruled in (word I cannot
read) that the amendments were unconstitutional and were therefore
void.