A most welcome proposal

A dedicated channel will be set up to broadcast the proceedings and other activities of the legislative assemblies.

In the last decades there has been a global trend for greater transparency in the proceedings of national legislative bodies. One aspect of that is the live broadcasting of parliamentary and parliamentary committee proceedings. It can be a traumatic experience for both parliamentarians and broadcasters, and can face fierce resistance from legislators. The idea was first mooted in the UK in the 1920s and firmly rejected. Permanent radio coverage of proceedings began in 1978 and TV broadcasts from the House of Commons began in 1990 — and have continued ever since. Now a conclave of the legislative assemblies of Pakistan have agreed to the setting up of a dedicated news channel to broadcast both live and in edited formats, the proceedings of the legislative assemblies at federal and provincial level. This newspaper warmly welcomes this development.

The benefits of such a move are obvious, not the least of these being that everybody with access to a television or radio is going to have direct access to the business of governance. In a country where transparency is a rare commodity in any walk of life, to have light shed on how the nuts and bolts of day-to-day parliamentary business is conducted is a large step in the right direction. There appears to be support for this across the board, from the legislatures of all the provinces. It was further proposed that ministers should in future issue policy statements in the National Assembly, rather than at the often chaotic and confused press conferences that are commonplace. The Free and Fair Election Network — long established in Pakistan — has proposed in a recent report that a dedicated TV and/or radio channel be set up to broadcast the proceedings of all legislative bodies, and that standing committees should likewise be open to public view. Anything that improves the quality of governance is to be welcomed. Elected representatives may find that this level of exposure is far from comfortable in some instances, but the general public will be able to see and hear those they voted — the sooner the better, we say.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 17^th, 2014.

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