Today (March 07) marks the 14th Anniversary of LNW. Below is a remark gushing over the 14 years of LNW and the hardships we came through.
Founded in 2009, LNW (then ‘Lanka News Web’) stepped itself out from the crib into a world so repressive of journalists seeking the truth, following the brutal assassination of Lasantha Wickremetunga, Editor of ‘Sunday Leader’, on January 08, 2009. Considered to be one of the worst moments of media repression in the history of Sri Lanka under the wrath of the then Rajapaksa Regime, the year led to the calling in of a dialogue related to the creation of a new web portal amongst a group of media experts, who at the time were living overseas for their own protection, in a mission to fulfil the need of a platform that advocates for Media Freedom, Human Rights, and opposes State-Repression.
After one month of painful trials, ‘Lanka News Web’, a trilingual web portal, was launched on March 07, 2009.
Starting a journey at a time Sri Lanka was suffering from State-Repression and nationalistic provocations triggered by the thirty-year-old Civil War, making the pit to the media a living hell, whilst forcing journalists of alternate visions to flee the country or resort to self-censorship, Lanka News Web blossomed so well that at one point it was even banned by the State within the local servers for months. Despite the ban, Lanka News Web continued to fight for the freedom of Sri Lankan Media and Human Rights and against corruption and fraud by publicly disclosing stories, becoming itself a hurdle jumper since 2009.
Lanka News Web was recently rebranded as ‘LNW Media Network’ and currently operates within walls that are preferring the Corporate Sector, and most notably is subjugated to criticism by our oldest readers for ‘walking out’ of the nature characterised as argumentative as we once were. However, LNW at present values the primary objective of creating job security for our staff who maintain the website’s continuity as a trilingual (Sinhala/Tamil/English) news aggregator.
In the days of Covid, LNW had to go through a very difficult situation financially, and notwithstanding being ‘financially challenged’ being second nature to us, the Pandemic improvised the scenario to a point where we barely escaped unscathed and without having to close our company.
The immense hardships during the Pandemic taught us a lesson, that we ought to maintain ourselves not only within the boundaries of socio-economic objectives, but business objectives as well. The responsibility of securing the future of the local and foreign staff working for us by embracing the risks we are passing through and trusting us for a long time was not easy, hence the rebranding being taken place.
LNW, accordingly, decided to cross the border and reach beyond the status of just a news aggregator, by spreading to several new dimensions including the Social Media. LNW is currently at the process of advancing itself into connecting with the Corporate Sector.
We are of a clear political view, a view that disregards party politics and takes the side of the people, the oppressed. We are unconditionally against any form of discrimination targeted against a person or a constituency and value the freedom of the people. That being said, we harbour no tradition of appearing to the oppressor in the cloak of impartiality, and provide equal opportunity for all parties, political or otherwise, to raise their opinion.
Being able to provide information to the public in a continuous journey for 14 years amongst a large number of news websites in Sri Lanka, LNW faced endless challenges on the way, but we truly thank our readers and friends who have stood by us and strengthened us in every moment. We invite everyone of you to further stay with us and grow with us, as we continue to change and renew.
