A former President of Nauru has accused the current President and justice minister of hypocrisy after they criticised media coverage of the government.
Former Nauru president Sprent Dabwido Photo: supplied
The current President, Baron Waqa, has recently said he is fed up with outsiders using Nauru as a punching bag.
However, Sprent Dabwido, who governed from 2011 to 2013, says it's hypocritical to blame international media, when the justice minister is maintaining a blanket local and international media ban.
Mr Dabwido says when he was in power, his government gave media access to asylum seeker detention centres and was able to show the world how things were done.
He says the justice minister, David Adeang, is paranoid about any form of media coverage, unless it's completely under his control.
Mr Dabwido also criticised last week's apparent move to ban Facebook on the island so that the government could not be criticised by its citizens online.
The Nauru government has denied that it has banned Facebook.
Facebook Photo: RNZ / Alexander Robertson