David Robie, Dili – Jornal Nacional Diaro is the smallest and youngest of Timor-Leste's three daily newspapers, but it's one of the brightest and gutsiest.

It sells around 600 copies a day, has barely more than a dozen young reporters and operates out of a derelict former Indonesian police station in the port city of Dili. Getting to a reporting job depends on a tired fleet of five small motorbikes parked in the paper's front yard.

The newspaper used to have eight machines, but three were stolen in raids at the height of the country's factional bloodshed in May last year. The violence led to at least 37 deaths and thousands of people fleeing to internal refugee camps.

Young editor-in-chief Josi Gabriel fiercely defends the independence of the paper, which boasts new president and Nobel peace laureate Dr. Josi Ramos Horta on its contributors' masthead.

The largest paper in Timor-Leste (formerly East Timor), Suara Timor Lorosae, has been a survivor since the country's rocky road to independence in 2002. As the country's former oldest paper, Suara Timor Timur, it was established in 1993 and was forced to obey conditions set by the Indonesian occupation. In the violence that wracked the country leading to the independence vote in 1999, Indonesian-backed militia destroyed the newspaper building and wrecked printing facilities.

Throughout Suara's existence, journalists were intimidated and terrorised by the Indonesian military and its supporters. But publisher Salvador Soares is equally hostile toward the post-independence administration led by the political party Fretilin, which spearheaded the struggle against Indonesian rule and oppression for more than a quarter century and then won a landslide victory in the first free parliament elections.

While Fretilin remained the largest political group in the June 30, 2007, election, it has this week been ousted from power by a coalition government after weeks of bickering. This fuelled further rioting.

Suara Timor Lorosae, now printed at a modern plant on the outskirts of Dili, sells about 2,000 copies a day. The third daily, Timor Post, regarded as the most independent, was founded in 2000 by a collective of senior journalists. It has a print run of 1500 copies and also struggles for resources.

Although the country has a population of almost one million people, the literacy rate is just 51 per cent and the country has four main languages. The press mainly uses the indigenous Tetum language. Newspapers cost 50 cents a copy – about a quarter of the US$2 average daily wage. Only a handful of hawkers sell newspapers in the streets of downtown Dili – stringing the papers in lively fan-style displays on long poles.

In spite of the problems of the fledgling press, the newspapers and their courageous journalists were praised for their contribution to free and fair elections by a recent New Zealand-funded independent media monitoring mission. The New Zealand bouquets were even more favourable for the state-owned broadcasters, Radio Timor Leste (RTL) and Television Timor Leste (TVTL). The broadcasters are providing an increasingly important media leadership in the country, concluded the mission.

While the mission was impressed by the effort and commitment of the state-owned public broadcasters, many journalists remain worried about the ambiguous status of the state broadcasters. RTL director Rosario Martins says the first national elections run by the Timorese institutions – the previous election was run by the United Nations – and the media covering them faced tough challenges. His team provided comprehensive coverage, broadcast election news and current affairs programmes for 2.5 hours a day on a campaign budget of US$21,500.

Many journalists proudly regard their country as having the most genuinely free press in the world because no regulations at present govern the media. Press freedom is guaranteed under section 41 of the constitution.

But there is a cloud on the horizon. Many politicians point to the lack of media training and are keen to impose tighter controls. Draft media laws contain provisions that could criminalise defamation, insist on the licensing of journalists and regulate strict right of reply requirements.

Section 40 of the constitution declares that everyone has the right to freedom of expression and the right to inform and be informed impartially. But about half the population has no hope of exercising this constitutional right because the combined newspaper circulation is barely 4000 copies a day – serving the elite – and radio and television have a limited reach.

Improved communications infrastructure is vitally needed, such as telecommunications, electrical supply and roading. Local media people would also like to see subsidised distribution of newspapers to the remote rural districts and state-funded distribution of community radios in rural areas.

For a 40-year-old vegetable seller and radio listener in a Dili market, the definition of good news is simple enough: "Good news for us is some change that can make our lives better."

[Pacific Media Centre director David Robie was a member of the New Zealand Media Monitoring Mission that visited Timor-Leste for the recent presidential and parliamentary elections.]