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Wed, Jun 6 Is print media next in line? By IE Wednesday June 6, 02:34 AM Local live broadcasts are dead, long live the foreign media' is the buzz in Pakistan. With the gagging orders swiftly implemented against the electronic media through a presidential ordinance on Monday, out goes the only thing for which the Musharraf regime could be credited. Bypassing Parliament, the presidential edict imposes unprecedented restrictions on the broadcast media that include television, radio, the internet and mobile phone services carrying independent news channels' transmission. What's next on the embattled general's agenda, the print media? The independent news channels falling under the axe include the three most popular ones with a massive following in the country and in the diaspora: Geo News, Aaj TV and ARY Oneworld. Cable operators were told within hours of the general's changing the rules governing the broadcast media to take the named channels off the air. Musharraf seems to have lost faith in his own policy under which the media enjoyed freedom for over five years now. The 11 amendments made to the laws governing the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) now entitle the authority to shut down any TV channel or radio station, cancel operating licences, impose fines and even confiscate broadcasting equipment and seal offices. The mechanism, passed by Parliament and now overwritten by the general, required Pemra to refer an errant channel's case to a parliamentary committee and proceed against a media organ only on its recommendation. The government move now leaves the affected parties with a sole recourse to file a petition in the Supreme Court against the gagging order. However, if Parliament votes the presidential ordinance into an amended Pemra law, which it is most likely to do, even a petition in the Supreme Court could be dismissed. Therefore, the affected parties and the government, both, are interested in settling the matter out of court on the basis of give and take. Or, given the public mood, maybe not. The mood in the streets in cities across the country is one of outrage. Protests continue over the closure of the news channels, with newspapers fully echoing public sentiment. The general, it is believed, is emboldened by the forceful show last week of support by the army top brass for his growingly unpopular moves in recent months. For the first time the closed-door meeting held at the army's General Headquarters (GHQ) in Rawalpindi Cantonment was covered by all TV channels and flashed around the world - the army's apparent answer to the rousing street welcome the suspended chief justice receives everywhere he goes. Within hours of the army meeting's broadcast, however, angry protesters rolled out in Islamabad and Lahore, chanting 'Go Musharraf go, loot ke kha gaya GHQ' (GHQ loots and plunders). The sentiment was also brought on by the launch at the weekend of a revealing book launched by the strategic political analyst Ayesha Siddiqa. Titled Military Inc.: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy, the book was sold out within hours of its hitting the shelves. Siddiqa subsequently appeared on TV talk shows, asserting her thesis that the military's economic interests militate against its retreat into barracks and the prospects of democracy taking root in Pakistan. Newspapers, too, gave extended coverage to Siddiqa's thesis, printing excerpts from the book in their weekend editions. Then the axe fell on live talk shows and news analyses broadcast by TV channels. A minority of Pakistanis who still have access to TV broadcasts via satellite dishes say the channels have kept on the heat. Aaj TV news director Talat Hussain and Geo News' Shahid Masood went the whole hog, saying the government could shut down their channels but they would not 'fall in line'. The future of live TV broadcasts after being declared illegal seems bleak for now. Given the angry SMS messages received from the public by the affected channels and run by them on the scroll, it is clear the audience wants the channels to be shut down in defiance rather than see them bend before the government. The short-lived freedom of expression, as seen on the airwaves, is history for now. That said, through long years of dictatorial rule, Pakistanis are accustomed to getting their uncensored news from sources as ubiquitous as the BBC and the All India Radio Urdu services. What to do if your own media is gagged? The writer is an editor with Dawn, Karachi
