Media in the crosshairsThe media remained the target of attack through 2014, caught in the crosshairs of guns wielded by militants, political and criminal elements and even professional rivals throughout 2014. The country was declared the world’s most dangerous place for journalists by the International Federation of Journalists, ahead of war-torn Syria. Fourteen journalists were killed during the year in what appeared to be targeted attacks – in some cases for exposing wrongdoing, in others for motives that remain mysterious.

The year began on a bad note, with a television channel reporter shot dead on January 1 in Larkana, allegedly for showing a pharmacy selling a drug that had a ‘not for resale’ label on it. The life of journalists it seems comes cheap. There were other incidents too, such as the attack on the office of the Online International News Network in Quetta in August. Three persons, including two journalists, were killed. There were no arrests and, as the PFUJ noted in his report released at the start of the year, this impunity contributed to making the year that has just passed possibly the worst on record for media professionals in the country.

The lack of accountability was visible also in the failure to identify those who had staged attacks on prominent journalists or issued threats. Geo news journalist Hamid Mir narrowly escaped death in May 2014 when he was attacked by gunmen in Karachi. Raza Rumi had to flee the country after his car was shot at in Lahore in March the same year. We still do not know who was responsible for these assaults or the threats issued to journalists. The trend seems dangerously to be on the rise.

It was not only individuals who were caught in the delicate line fire. The Jang/Geo media house was taken off the air for 15 days following charges of blasphemy made during a morning show, with the incident leading to a mass campaign in which newspapers belonging to the group were attacked and all Geo channels erased from cable networks long beyond the Pemra dictated period of a 15-day suspension. There were strong suspicions of rivalries and politics at play in the unpleasant series of events.

Other channels came under attack too, with the PTV headquarters in Islamabad broken into by PTI and PAT activists on September 1 during their sit-in in the capital. For 40 minutes, the national network vanished from the airwaves. No one has been punished for what happened; and no one has been punished for the attacks made on media professionals by political activists including those from the PTI – a party which has repeatedly lashed out at Geo, accusing it of being an enemy agent with activists beating up its reporters covering their rallies.

While the year has been a bleak one for the media, it has also been a time when the need is arisen for it to reflect on its own actions. The issue of hate speech broadcast over channels has been raised again and again. This is a matter that has to be addressed. Media responsibility is just as important as is the need by the state to protect it. We also lost key figures who have shaped the media in Pakistan during the last year, with Majeed Nazami, one of the country’s best known editors whose contributions go beyond the realm of journalism, passing away in July 2014.

The hold of the media over the minds of people continues to grow. It has shown resilience in the face of violence, and its evolution continues at a time when it is clear it must play a critical role in shaping the future of our country.

The News

2014 has been one of the most difficult years for the Pakistani media. Due to the alarming, yet familiar, threats from militant groups, law enforcement agencies, and political parties, the Pakistani media remained bitterly divided.

The annual press freedom report released here by Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF) said that 2014 saw media professionals paying a heavy price in blood. Their strived to keep Pakistani citizens informed in an increasingly polarized and violence prone country. Eight media personnel, including three journalists, were killed during the year. At least thirty-five media practitioners were injured during 2014.

The unprecedented reversals in media freedom include divisions between media organisations, which isolated the local media group. The ensuing viscous propaganda between said group and rival media badly tarnished of the image the media among the public. Having isolated the group, the distribution of the group’s newspapers and television channels was disrupted to an extent not previously seen in the history of the country.

The bickering between media groups overshadowed the loss of life they were collectively suffering. For instance, the fatal shooting of reporter Shan Dahar on December 31, 2013, in Larkana, Sindh, did not garner the attention it should have. He was short in the back and taken to a hospital where he remained unattended to until he succumbed to his injuries the next day. Only a handful of days later another private channel’s DSNG van was attacked on January 17, 2014 resulted in the death of three media workers.

In March, Raza Rumi faced a deadly attack – while he survived, his driver died in the attack. On August 28, 2014, unidentified assailants barged into the offices of a news agency in Quetta and murdered Bureau Chief Irshad Mustoi, reporter Abdul Rasool Khajjak, and accountant Muhammad Younas.

The largest number of injuries occurred on August 31, 2014, when 28 journalists, camera operators, and other media workers, were injured while covering the clashes between the police and the protesters during the demonstrations led by the opposition Pakistan Tehrik Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Awami Tehrik (PAT).

The next day on September 1, 2014, protestors belonging to PTI and PAT attacked the offices of state owned Pakistan Television (PTV). They took over the control room and running broadcasts were disrupted for a few hours. Supporters of PTI also continued to harass and intimidate the staff members of a private news channel after PTI Chairman Imran Khan alleged that it was complicit in the election rigging that took place in 2013.

Perhaps the only positive aspect in all this could be the realization among the media that effective codes of conduct are needed for a more ethical and peaceful working environment. There is also a greater realization among media organizations of the need to cooperate with civil society and political groups. This is so the issues of media safety and stifled freedom of expression can be addressed.

On the positive side, the killers of Wali Khan Babar, a Pakistani journalist, were convicted by the criminal justice system on Saturday March 1, 2014. A Pakistani court convicted six men for Babar’s murder. He was shot dead in Karachi in January 2011.

Pakistan Today

There were other reporters in the crew, too. From the hotels to the lunches, mostly everything was paid for: our job, as defined by the fellowship, was to cover the hundreds of delegates from across the world of anti-corruption and understand their ‘fight the good fight’ narratives. It was all very charming, really.

Naturally curious, I asked the Pakistan question. The Pakistani delegation was missing from the conference, but I started running into people who knew of Transparency International Pakistan (TIP), and its powerful leader, Adil Gilani, the twice-elected chairperson of the outfit. Noticeable was the nervous twitch, the curt tone, the glib ‘yeah, we’ve heard about the Pakistan TI chapter’s work’ utterances; but, frankly, I couldn’t find a story. Gilani wasn’t around (it would soon emerge that he was being probed by Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency around that time) and nobody gave up too much information.

Much like the Pakistani military, which I also cover, there was a sense of fraternity amongst the TI brass that was essentially aimed at protecting their own: At TI, messaging and perception for reputation management was a key strategy, less sharing facts.

Four years later, it’s becoming clear why an anti-corruption watchdog like Transparency International is so particularly good at keeping the lid on its own transparency. Months of investigations published in series in this newspaper since last fall have highlighted in detail the conflicts of interest and irregularities that plague Transparency International Pakistan, particularly its senior leadership, all under the neglectful or complicit gaze of TI’s global bosses in Berlin, but not much has happened in terms of the accountability.

(Note: Immediately after my initial reports [“Who’s Watching the Watchdog”, published here last October, there was no response, rejoinder or clarification from TI and/or TIP about my findings. After some prodding, the current TIP leadership accused me of being “young”, and, worse, humiliated me in official correspondence, but there was no significant response to counter or acknowledge my claims.)

TI donor interest in my findings, probably for their own due diligence, as well as continued reminders to TI’s Berlin-based Secretariat (TIS) seeking a response about their Pakistan chapter’s discrepancies eventually paved the way for an internal investigation against TIP to be launched earlier this summer.

Considering this was happening at a time when TIP’s accreditation was up for renewal, and TI’s Berlin Secretariat was in the midst of securing major international donations, here was a conveniently timely development. What was disheartening, though, was the process: TIP was investigating TIP itself.

A “misogynistic old boys club, who scratch each others’ backs”, as a former TIP Trustee, the institutional graft expert and scholar Ayesha Siddiqa told me, was going to set upon the path of righteous self-correction. It was a tall order, and not very transparent either.

Also unfortunate was that this in-house “ethics hearing” was happening under the complicit watch of the TI bosses in Berlin, who have made their reputation telling the world about how internally-led investigations are a terrible idea. Such double standards were compounded by delay tactics – like TIP insisting I attend their meetings and bring my proofs to Karachi, despite of logistical and financial constraints – which ended up blocking any real progress into the investigation of the discrepancies at TIP. If there were any findings about TIP’s ethical standards, or lack of, none of them were shared with either the free press or myself.

Today, Adil Gilani has returned to the forefront of TIP activities. Despite being an advisor – he’s served out the permitted two consecutive chair terms, and is waiting out the rules to make a comeback for a third – Gilani’s essentially ‘pulling a Putin’ as he continues to be the de facto operational boss and public face of the organisation. Most of the notification letters (over 90 percent) the watchdog has made a business of sending to public and private institutions carry his name; he grants interviews and claims access to boardrooms in the name of TIP, even though he’s not an executive, staffer or Trustee of the organisation. And he negotiates with different parties in the name of TIP for purposes clear (like following requisite procurement and tender rules) and unclear (like positioning TIP and its affiliates on procurement boards). Thus, it’s crucial to understand what this very powerful, if unofficial, leader of TIP has been up to since bearing the standard of this country’s premier anti-corruption watchdog.

First, conflicts of interest: From the late 2000s, Gilani served as a shareholder and director of the AKD REIT (Real Estate Investment Trust) Management Company, a property development arm of stock-market heavyweight Aqeel Karim Dhedi’s empire. In recent years, he went on to represent AKD’s real estate interests legally, operationally and institutionally, while under his stewardship and around the same time period, the watchdog TIP went to war: notifying, warning and sue the competition – other real estate developers like Emaar and Meinhardt – that AKD was up against in Karachi’s mega real estate schemes race. Details of these and other irregularities of the Gilani-AKD combine were documented in this newspaper last October; none of them were challenged by TI, TIP and/or AKD.

Also, neither has Gilani publicly registered his conflict of interest statements stating these discrepancies, a direct contravention of at least three clauses of TIP’s own Governance Manual. Needless to say, neither Gilani, nor TIP, respond to my queries, either.

But those are dreary, technical findings, all previously reported. To be fair, TIP was unjustly lambasted during the Asif Ali Zardari regime by Rehman Malik’s Interior Ministry and accused of being a “private detective agency”. But TIP has also been slammed, not prejudicially, of political misconduct, too.

The journalist and intellectual-at-large, Raza Rumi, was not the only one to question TIP’s more-loyal-than-the-king, and very out of ambit, politicking during the early days of Geo’s closure last April, when it issued a gratuitous statement supporting the Jang/Geo network’s shutdown in the wake of the Hamid Mir issue.

The politicking would go further back, to last summer, when Adil Gilani would use TIP’s official platform to “run a proper online election campaign, promoting IK & PTI [Imran Khan and his Pakistan Tahreek-e-Insaf]”, according to the former TIP trustee, Ayesha Siddiqa. And then, of course, was the heady year of 2010, when Gilani would fight tooth and nail against everything the other Gilani – Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani – pitched, even the controversial and inter-institutional turf war between legislature and judiciary that was the Contempt of Court bill, which would be oddball and not dispassionate politics for a transparency watchdog.

That same year, ace investigative reporter Rauf Klasra would a do a whole series on the multibillion-rupee NICL [National Insurance Corporation Limited] scam: guess who would feature prominently in the murky scandal? Adil Gilani, the same man whose letters had unfurled the shady scheme in the first place, was eventually investigated by the FIA for staying in contact with an absconder, Qasim Dada, and, more seriously, for offering a bailout-indemnity scheme via a Memorandum of Understanding to the troubled NICL board (basically, a ‘follow-TI’s-procurement-recommendations-for-a-clean-chit-from-TI’ deal), which was corroborated directly or indirectly by at least four board members.

Also, the same year, the recently expired Majid Nizami would edit a remarkable story for his The Nation along, as would competitor Arif Nizami for Pakistan Today, further establishing how TIP/Gilani’s modus operandi would go into play for access to boardrooms and secretariats: In the case of PNSC [Pakistan National Shipping Corporation], Gilani would exploit discrepancies by implementing a brilliantly simple stratagem: first, he would discover an irregularity (a conflict of interest, one allegedly involving Secretary Ports and Shipping, Saleem Khan, and his wife); next, he would shoot off letters to the institution, grabbing its attention and creating panic; then, he would threaten to disclose the irregularities to the media; eventually, the resultant leverage would help him install a TIP affiliate, in this case his own son, Sohrab, on the PNSC board. When the arrangement became untenable, Sohrab would eventually resign and move on, but the marvelous template of maneuvering would remain: Pick an institution; spot a problem; threaten to publicise the problem; land a favour (like a procurement, governance or advisory board position), and then sit back and relax till the weather changed.

Gilani’s discrepancies are not news now, nor were they back in late 2010, just around the time I was serving my TI fellowship in Thailand, exactly when the FIA was investigating Pakistan’s watchdog-in-chief and asking him some pertinent and disturbing questions, the responses to which have yet to be officially disclosed by him or his colleagues, despite of TIP’s Governance Manual protocols that call for full disclosure to battle real and even perceived conflicts of interest.

To cite Rauf Klasra’s investigation of the FIA investigation: How did Gilani’s job history qualify him as Pakistan’s watchdog-in-chief; why was he terminated from his job at Karachi Port Trust; did he sign an NICL-type MoU with Pakistan State Oil as well, which was terminated later (more on Gilani’s PSO dealings is coming up); whether Gilani had been getting financial benefits from his “clients” (or patrons like AKD) with whom he used to sign such MoUs; what about his “private consultancies”; did he sign an agreement with Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA) to perform the role of a watchdog or he was acting on his own without any formal understanding; what methodology was he was following to verify facts about any official irregularity taking place in any particular government department; and what were the strengths and qualifications of the staff he was using to dig out those irregularities, embezzlements and frauds in government departments?

Years later, I would string some of those answers together: former NAB [National Accountability Bureau] official, TIP Trustee and insider Ayesha Siddiqa would help, claiming that “Gilani’s old boys network didn’t have the forensic or financial expertise to make the claims they made”; that their own internal spending – which is not easily calculable as their internal audits and statements are not publicly itemised for discretionary and events spending – was “inappropriate and excessive, especially for entertainment and events”; and that TIP would apply pressure tactics on its associates – in one instance in 2012, recalls Siddiqa, Gilani personally demanded that Siddiqa, then an advisor to former chairman of NAB, Admiral Fasih Bokhari, should “treat with care a couple of friends” who were under a corruption investigation.

These were FBR officials – allegedly involved in a scam of 40 billion rupees in unpaid taxes by cellular phone companies – who were “buddies of Adil Gilani and enough of a reason for him to interfere in and influence” an ongoing federal investigation, according to Siddiqa.

Some of the other questions can perhaps be answered by a closer look at Gilani’s 2012 tax returns: Two houses in DHA Karachi, valued at the modest sum of eight and nine million, which would make them the best buys on North Street and Zulfiqar Street, if not all of Karachi. Also, two plots in Phase VIII of DHA Karachi, declared worth seven and three million each, which makes them the best value for money for whoever purchases them from Gilani, or, if you know your Karachi property rates, raises the question of him wrongly declaring their actual value. Of course, the property question is compounded by Rs65 million in saving certificates and bank accounts for a man who’s a former government servant turned NGO-wallah and, in 2012, a mysterious 50 million rupees “Supply of Goods” payment for which he’s only paid 3.5 percent in taxes, makes one wonder how lucrative the watchdog business really is.

But let’s not forget that on tax returns filed from 2009-11, Pakistan’s premier watchdog’s chairman was citing his email address as “Mohammad.saqib@akdcapital.com”, which belonged to the Chief Accountant and Company Secretary of AKD Capital Limited. See, young Saqib, a talented accountant, was filing taxes on behalf of Gilani while “providing administrative support to AKD management”; this made sense, for Gilani was using AKD’s executive offices to plan and execute much of TIP’s operations, according to two sources inside AKD’s company who asked to remain anonymous.

Not long before he was assassinated, Punjab Governor Salman Taseer, always an avid social media user and not one to hold back, tweeted about TIP: “Transparency International is run by a local, Adil Gilani, who was fired from KPT [Karachi’s port authority] for fraud. Neither transparent nor international.”

Next, Gilani would file a defamation lawsuit against Taseer for $5.8 million; but soon after, Taseer would be assassinated, shot multiple times by his own bodyguard for defending the truth about the poor of this wretched land; with him would go his details about the TIP overlord’s transgressions.

There is a joke at Harvard Business School: that some of the answers lie with the accountants, but all of the answers rest with the dead. In the case of TIP and Taseer, Harvard’s bad joke stands redeemed.

Continued

The News

Against this backdrop, a group of experts on Pakistan and its media came together, under the auspices of the Commonwealth Journalists Association and the Institute of Commonwealth Studies at the University of London to discuss the threats facing the country’s journalists. In a discussion chaired by BBC presenter Owen Bennett Jones, former High Commissioner of Pakistan Wajid Shamsul Hasan, Kiran Hassan of the International Institute of Strategic Studies, BBC Urdu Service Editor Aamer Ahmed Khan, New York Times Pakistan Bureau Chief Declan Walsh and renowned journalist and author Babar Ayaz tried to answer the question, How safe is it to be a journalist in Pakistan?

Censorship in Pakistan used to be straightforward, explained Khan. Certain topics were simply off limits. Today, the situation is more complicated and more confusing. Threats to journalists and press freedom take many different shapes, and come from many different sources, including the government, extremists like the Taliban, the intelligence service ISI and powerful media owners.

There are currently 84 different cases against Geo TV, of which 53 are over blasphemy. You cannot defend yourself against that, said Khan. Ayaz raised a similar point when arguing that extremists are the biggest threat to the media. The government might put a person in jail, but these extremist groups will kill for their beliefs, Ayaz said.

While Geo TV and ISI have long been fighting behind closed doors, the case of Hamid Mir created an “open battlefield”, explained Walsh, who was expelled from Pakistan in May 2013. The station aired reports linking the security services to the attack.

Walsh also brought up the ownership issue within the Pakistani television landscape, which he says has gone from “zero to 100″ in the past few years. The country today boasts some 90 TV stations. Editorial control remains with media owners, according to Hassan.

But even journalists themselves did not escape criticism. Sections of the media are responsible for the current situation through irresponsible reporting, said Hasan. Quite a few were “playing with fire” by earlier glorifying the Taliban as peacemakers, he explained. Khan also highlighted corruption within the media as a “novel form of censorship”. However, as Khan pointed out, it is difficult for the Pakistani media to be responsible, without enabling them to be responsible. Most of the information that effects people’s lives is under strict control by authorities, he said.

Hassan, however, argued that there has been some progress. Journalists, and by extension the threats they face, are more visible and garner more attention today. She also pointed out that despite part closures, all Pakistan’s TV stations are still running. There was some talk of the role of media regulation in improving the situation, and Hassan said she had hopes for Pemra, the Pakistan Electronic Media Regularity Authority.

Yet, the overall conclusion was that Pakistan is not a safe place to be a journalist – illustrated well by Walsh explaining how, for the first time since he’s covered Pakistan, The New York Times recently had to use a pseudonym to protect their reporter on the ground.

Hasan summed it up: “The establishment doesn’t want the media to be as free as it can be.”

This article was originally posted on 24 February 2014 at indexoncensorship.org

IFEX

This week’s incident saw unidentified attackers placed a bomb in the home of Jamshed Baghwan, the bureau chief of the Express News. Both the house and a car were damaged when the device exploded. The journalist and his family escaped the attack as Baghwan had seen unidentified men on a motorcycle planting the bomb. He and his wife took cover as the bomb exploded.

Police have begun an investigation into the attack but as yet no arrests have been made.

Unidentified men had previously planted a bomb at his home in March this year – that device was found and defused. A month later, masked men hurled a hand grenade at his home.

The latest attack is the fourth on a journalist associated with Express News in 2014. The TV channel has lost four staff members. In January, three employees were shot dead in Karachi when its van came under attack. In March, senior anchor Raza Rumi was attacked in Lahore and his driver was killed. In 2013, the channel’s Karachi office was attacked twice, without any casualties.

The PFUJ has expressed “anguish and pain” over the latest incident, noting the failure of authorities to protect Baghwan despite them being aware that he has been targeted twice before. The PFUJ said: “The attack has further increased the sense of insecurity among journalists as its shows that police are not taking the attacks on media seriously.”

Despite national and international campaigns, and repeated commitments from the government of Pakistan, the attacks on journalists and media continue to rise in one of the world’s most dangerous countries for journalists.

The IFJ said: “The deteriorating security situation for journalists in Pakistan is deeply concerning. We call for an immediate investigation into the latest attack. Pakistan’s journalists are confronted by a horrific situation: a disturbing spike in violent attacks on individual journalists as well as the ruthless targeting of specific news outlets. Decisive action must be taken to improve their security.”

“The government must heed the calls of the media community in Pakistan and take meaningful steps to ensure the safety of journalists. The government must make every effort to ensure that death threats and violent attacks on journalists and media outlets are thoroughly investigated and the perpetrators brought to justice.”

International Federation of Journalists

He saw men who arrived on a motorcycle planting the bomb, enabling him and his wife enough time to take cover before the bomb went off.

A bomb was planted at his home in March this year, which was defused. A month later, masked men hurled a hand grenade at his house.

It was the fourth attack this year on a journalist associated with Express News, an Urdu-language TV news channel.

In January, three employees were shot dead in Karachi in an attack on a van. In March, presenter Raza Rumi was attacked in Lahore and his driver was killed.

The Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists accused the authorities of failing to protect Baghwan despite it having been targeted twice before. It said: “The attack has further increased the sense of insecurity among journalists as its shows that police are not taking the attacks on media seriously.”

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) also condemned the attack, saying it was deeply concerned by “the deteriorating security situation for journalists in Pakistan.”

The IFJ said: Pakistan’s journalists are confronted by a horrific situation: a disturbing spike in violent attacks on individual journalists as well as the ruthless targeting of specific news outlets. Decisive action must be taken to improve their security.”

The Guardian

The one-point agenda of the sub-committee of the Standing Committee on Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage is: detailed briefing on the investigation of all attacks/martyred/killing on media persons since 2011 to date from each province/territory; and the criteria adopted to provide compensation to the families of the media persons who were killed/martyred/injured in terrorist attacks while performing duty.

Ms Naeema Kishwar Khan is the convener of the sub-committee while its members include Muhammad Talal Chaudhry, Imran Zafar Leghari and Afzal Khan Jadoon.Since the briefing will cover the attacks on journalists to-date, it will obviously include the assassination attempt on eminent Geo TV anchor Hamid Mir in Karachi on April 19.

In a piece, titled ‘Pakistan’s Media Under Siege’, written in The Wall Street Journal on Monday, Amnesty International’s Pakistan researcher Mustafa Qadri wrote that at least 34 Pakistani journalists have been killed because of their reporting since democracy was restored in 2008. In only one case have those responsible been brought to justice. This year alone five journalists have been killed and dozens more have either received death threats, or were abducted and tortured, or survived attempts on their lives.

He wrote that attacks on the media are not new in Pakistan. But events over the past weeks have brought the crisis in Pakistan’s journalism into sharp focus. On April 19, gunmen tried to assassinate Hamid Mir, a popular news anchor with the largest private broadcaster

Geo TV.

“. . . The standoff is a chilling reminder of the ever-present threat of censorship that hangs over media enterprises as well as individual journalists. . . Geo TV’s allegations . . . must be taken seriously. Only a thorough, independent and impartial investigation will reveal Hamid Mir’s assailants. Dozens of other journalists have also contacted Amnesty International to register claims of harassment and abuse. Most refused to go public about their ordeals out of fear for their lives and the lives of their loved ones,” Qadri wrote.

He noted that only a few of the 74 cases investigated by Amnesty International have led to prosecution, with conviction in two cases. “This failure has sent the signal that powerful actors are free to stifle the media through violence. That in turn has a chilling effect on freedom of expression and the society’s ability to openly discuss social and political issues, as journalists increasingly self-censor to avoid the risk of abuse. Only immediate steps to address this impunity can stem the rising tide of abuses. The Pakistani government must start by ensuring that the perpetrators in all cases, including the high-profile assassination attempts on Hamid Mir and Raza Rumi, are brought to justice regardless of their affiliations. The media enterprises themselves must also provide adequate training, support and assistance to their staff and not undermine the efforts of rival outlets to seek justice for their journalists.

Without these urgent steps, there is a very serious risk that more of Pakistan’s journalists will be intimidated into silence.”

The News

In a statement issued from London, Hussain said, “It is on the record that the banned outfit Tehreek-e-Taliban has prepared a hit list of journalists and anchor-persons and Hamid Mir’s name tops the list. It was the responsibility of the government to conduct an impartial investigation to expose those responsible for the attack on Hamid Mir, he added.

Few days ago terrorists had attacked a senior journalist Raza Rumi in Lahore, which resulted in his driver’s death. Journalist and anchor-person Iftikhar Ahmed was threatened of dire consequences if he did not stop writing about Taliban and a senior journalist Imtiaz Alam was forced to leave his organization, Hussain said.

The News

While the motive and responsibility for the dastardly assault on Hamid Mir in Karachi is still a matter of speculation, the threat to the freedom of expression in Pakistan is nothing new. However, the drastic escalation of violence thereof against the Fourth Estate by the targeting of well-known media personnel is very disturbing.

To quote my article ‘Media and accountability’ of December 6, 2007, “The ‘honest broker’ role of the media is one of its most important functions. The people need the media to provide them with a fair and accurate report of events and policies. Even in times of great trials and upheaval, like the situation obtaining in Pakistan today, the people must be involved in important decision-making. They can only be so if they are part of the process. The media helps get them involved. Without a free and independent media, citizens cannot know that their voices will be heard.

“The media in Pakistan has been increasingly subjected to different types of intimidation to silence the voice of dissent and truth. The same (Musharraf) regime that to its credit allowed ‘a hundred flowers to bloom’ in the media has engaged in acts of vandalising, threatening telephone calls, illegal detentions, harassment and use of various state bodies against journalists, writers, media owners and other members of the media. These tactics are systematic pattern of harassment and victimisation used against those who cannot otherwise be tamed or bribed. Governments should realise that being in power they need to be held accountable”.

While terrorists and criminals employ the same tools of intimidation, the media is showing increasing courage in fighting back to protect the freedom of expression.

Contributing to the institutionalisation and strengthening of democracy by promoting good governance, the Pakistani media has raised the level of knowledge among people by exposing the crimes and misdeeds of the national/international criminals, smugglers and terrorists. A bridge between the government and the opposition, between the government and the people, between people and their representatives and between national and global interests, the media has given voice to the grievances of the neglected people in society.

As per my article ‘Media as an economic force multiplier”, dated November 8, 1999, “Democracies depend upon the media to maintain the sanctity of trust imposed by the people on any government. Without the media to exercise an effective check, authority has a tendency to go berserk in all senses of the word, combining misuse of powers with nepotism, favouritism and outright corruption.” This accountability makes the media into a measure of dread for those who fear such accountability. Accountability also requires the government to publish the list of those in the media paid by any state organ.

While the right to disagree is a fundamental prerogative and one has to respect that right, it must be on the basis of facts, logic and force of arguments. The media must not become party to confusing issues by resorting to conjecture and the coalescing of emotions. Apportioning blame and making accusations on the basis of apprehension rather than on hard evidence takes the focus away from apprehending and prosecuting the actual perpetrators. Objective analysis and presentation on issues of consequence means both criticism and accusation must be done in good faith, rather than for denigrating something for personal vested interests and ulterior motives for maligning somebody.

The gut reaction alleging ISI involvement in the Hamid Mir case is most unfortunate. As vocal critics of the government, the army and the ISI, both Raza Rumi and Imtiaz Alam could have made the same allegations. While it is Hamid Mir’s fundamental right to accuse anyone from whom he feels a life threat, perception cannot take precedence over hard evidence. Knowing that Hamid Mir was making such accusations anyone could have taken advantage by a ‘false flag’ operation to put the blame on the ISI.

While this was a professional ‘hit’ of a target killer, six bullets in the body out of nine fired, it did not have the hallmark of being professionally executed as a set-piece ambush. Putting it bluntly, if it were the ISI Hamid Mir would be dead!

We must wait for the Judicial Commission’s enquiry. Do we align ourselves with the Indian media going to town on our vital state organs without all the facts uncovered? Freedom of expression cannot become a licence to attack the integrity of the state by vicious propaganda. We must not get carried away with emotions and/or jump to conclusions, professionalism requires fact-based analysis and investigation.

According to Wikipedia, “mass media have a basic responsibility to help strengthen and support democratic processes. Fairness, honesty and ethical behaviour and open, probing minds must be nurtured. Journalists have to be committed to the excellence of their profession to its high standards, and to its defence. Journalists must also take upon themselves an important duty – to act as the people’s agents in seeking the truth and uncovering falsehood. They must adhere to the highest moral and ethical standards”.

Journalists and editors must report the news without injecting into it their own points of view. Sometimes we transgress this aspect of self-governance and responsibility thereof.

In the prevailing circumstances the Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors (CPNE) has taken a bold initiative for the protection of the media by tasking a newly formed Defence and Security Committee (DSC) to work towards a solution for the security problems facing media groups and their employees. The DSC will prepare a comprehensive security strategy for securing and sustaining media facilities throughout Pakistan during both natural and man-made emergencies such as terrorist attacks, natural disasters and all other threats or attacks nationwide, to ensure operation of media facilities before, during and after any major emergency.

Recommendations will include detecting, preparing for, preventing, protecting against, responding to and recovering from emergencies thereof. These will assure optimal reliability, robustness and security of media facilities throughout Pakistan, by arranging: (1) security audit and risk-assessment of media houses, safety training of employees of media groups and expansion of risk awareness; (2) creation of a special desk for media emergencies in the control rooms of a major private security company in each city with all media personnel getting a special number to call in an emergency; (3) monitoring media personnel moving to any trouble area if he or she will inform the control room at his or her discretion about his probable destination; (4) constantly re-evaluating risks, teaching media personnel operational discretion, training and awareness of post-emergency procedures; and (5) devising comprehensive medical insurance cover for in- hospital cases.

Instead of resorting to ‘ad hoc’ and/or ‘containment’ measures, reacting and fire-fighting, the DSC will prepare a well-crafted comprehensive policy for the protection of media freedom that is not straitjacketed by fixed mindsets. Freedom of expression being under threat, we must think ‘out of the box’ in devising ways and means to effectively counter this existential threat.

The writer is a defence and political analyst. Email: ikram.sehgal@wpplsms.com

The News

In the last six months or so, the Express Group offices in Karachi were attacked twice, three of the group’s staffers were killed in the same city (owned by Taliban), our anchor person Raza Rumi had a close shave in Lahore but his driver was not so lucky, our bureau chief in Peshawar escaped two attempts at his home. And what was the response of the media industry at large? Couldn’t care less!
Compared to the Pakistani media, its Afghan counterpart is just a toddler in age and experience. But look at the way the Afghan media has reacted collectively to an attack on one of its members and his family by the Taliban. This is not the way we do it in Pakistan. We don’t even name the attack victims, let alone identify the organisation to which they belong to.

We have fought four military regimes and as many civilian dictatorships. Our struggle for press freedom is legendary. The media is perhaps the only section of our society which has kept aloft the democratic flag during the darkest of the dictatorial days. We take pride in being one of the most vibrant media in this part of the world.

The price for being so lively has been very heavy, especially since the commencement of the War on Terror. Pakistan, today, is ranked as one of the most dangerous countries for journalists in the world. As many as 50 journalists have lost their lives in the last seven to eight years while reporting from various parts of the country, which has now become a virtual war zone.

The perpetrators have been both, the state and non-state actors. Both try to manipulate the media to promote their respective propaganda. Those that refuse to toe their line are harassed by both and those that prefer factual reporting, rather than what the perpetrators want them to report, are most often than not silenced forever, leaving no clue as to who pulled the gun.

Jihadi outfits that now dot the length and breadth of the country did not just appear on the scene one fine morning out of the blue. They were all mid-wifed by you-know-who for a strategic purpose. And the same agencies also manipulated a large chunk of the media to serve as the mouthpiece of these militant organisations. And every one of these three actors — the state, the non-state actors, as well as the jihadi media –– thrived until the very state of Pakistan appeared to be on the verge of being overwhelmed by these non-state actors and their propagandists.

And when the falling out began, a kind of anarchy set in with the state actors trying desperately to control the damage, the non-state actors trying equally desperately to establish their supremacy at gunpoint and the jihadi propagandists within the media industry trying to set the national agenda as they saw fit through their own marketing prisms.

The attack on one of Geo’s leading anchor persons is one of the manifestations of this anarchy. While condemning the murderous attack and praying for his quick recovery, let us not ignore the vertical and horizontal polarisation in the media that has been caused by Hamid Mir’s tragedy.

Express Tribune