Reykjavík Grapevine - 06.10.2017, Side 14

Sigmundur
Davíð Attacks
The Media
(Again)
The chilling effect of threatening lawsuits
Words: Paul Fontaine
Photos: Art Bicnick
Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson,
currently running for parliament
with his own party Miðflokkurinn
and polling fairly well, is once
again employing a tactic he has
been using for years now: berating
and threatening to sue reporters
when he doesn’t like how they re-
port on him.
Sigmundur is aiming to sue
three media outlets—Kjarninn,
Stundin and public broadcasting
service RÚV—for their reporting
of his involvement with Wintris,
the company that the Panama Pa-
pers leak revealed Sigmundur and
his wife had used to keep money
in an overseas tax shelter. Sig-
mundur has not been very specific
about what, exactly, their coverage
got wrong, but his choice to sue
them in particular is very telling.
Sigmundur, and many others
in his old party, the Progressives,
have long levelled the baseless ac-
cusation at RÚV that they are bi-
ased against him. Kjarninn and
Stundin are smaller, independent
news services. While RÚV may
have the resources to fight a law-
suit, things are decidedly more
difficult for smaller-scale outlets
when it comes to defending them-
selves in court.
Old tricks
This isn’t the first time he’s done
this, either. Sigmundur had per-
sonally met with former head of
RÚV Páll Magnússon in 2013, ac-
cusing the service of being biased
against him. In 2014, Sigurður Már
Jónsson, press secretary for the
government when Sigmundur was
Prime Minister, contacted Grape-
vine, taking issue with a story we
had done about Sigmundur’s ab-
sences from parliament and the
number of assistants he has. While
there were no factual errors in our
reporting, Sigurður objected to our
tone, and with the fact that one of
our reporters tweeted her own
news stories, which he errone-
ously contended violated journal-
istic ethics. Sigmundur also had a
meeting with the editorial board
of 365 Media, the company which
runs newspaper Fréttablaðið and
television Stöð 2, in 2015, com-
plaining that their news coverage
was “making things difficult” for
him.
This continuous meddling with
journalists even drew the atten-
tion of Reporters Without Bor-
ders, which expressed concerns
regarding Iceland’s press freedom
ranking in 2016 due to “worsening
relations between politicians and
the media.”
In point of fact, there is noth-
ing wrong with the reporting RÚV,
Kjarninn and Stundin did about
Wintris. It is absolutely true that
Tortola, the island where Wintris
was located, is a tax shelter. It is
also true that no taxes were paid
on the money being kept there un-
til the matter was brought to light.
Sigmundur may not even win this
case in court. The gambit being
played here is the “chilling effect,”
that is, the use of threats, direct or
implied, to make reporters more
reluctant to report on him criti-
cally, out of fear of having to burn
a lot of money and time in court.
Fighting back
Shortly after news broke of the
lawsuits, Omar R. Valdimarsson, a
district court attorney, announced
on Facebook that he and District
Court attorneys Daníel Thor Skals
Pedersen and Jóhannes S. Ólafsson
have formed a group called Ritfrel-
si, or “freedom of writing.” This
group’s purpose is to provide pro
bono legal services for journalists
being targeted for lawsuits such as
this, and Ómar is asking for more
lawyers to volunteer.
As Sigmundur is, if current
polling is reflected in election re-
sults later this month, very likely
taking a seat in parliament again,
the need for such a service is possi-
bly more and important than ever.
14 The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 18 — 2017
Cafe Paris | Austurstræti 14 | 101 Reykjavík
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BREAKFAST
BRUNCH
LUNCH
DINNER
§
§
§
TIME CAPSULE
Landsbankinn
Words: Jenna Mohammed
Photo: Art Bicnick

In 2013, five years after the finan-
cial crisis, one of Iceland’s major
banks, Landsbankinn, redesigned
its headquarters. Currently Lands-
bankinn holds all of its operations
under one roof at Austurhöfn,
which is the original Lands-
bankinn building and one of the
city’s most important landmarks.
It’s one of those buildings down-
town that you stare at in awe, won-
dering what purpose it holds.
Well, it’s a bank. The redesign
project was entrusted to the Ice-
landic Architectural Association,
which held a competition for the
most cost-effective and ecologi-
cal design. In the end the project
was estimated to have cost around
700 million ISK. Today, the upper
floors of the four-story building
are rented out, which makes its
maintenance more cost effective.
The idea behind centralizing the
bank’s operations under one roof
was that it made fiscal sense to do
business in one convenient spot,
instead of having different sectors
all over the capital area.
The story behind the new
Landsbankinn headquarters is
rather interesting; when you go
in for a quick currency exchange,
make sure you take advantage of
the free coffee too.
Simmi Simmi ya Simmi yam Simmi yay / give him the mic so he can take it away
/ Off on a litiguous charge, bon voyage / yeah from the home of some sheep,
Hrafnabjörg III squad