Govt decides to pursue legal notice against Jang Group

President asks the group to print a contradiction or face a multi-million dollar lawsuit.

ISLAMABAD: The government has decided to go ahead with the legal notice it had served on the Jang Group despite the attempt by the media organization to take the plea of press freedom.

Spokesperson to President Asif Ali Zardari, Farhatullah Babar, told The Express Tribune that the government has decided to pursue the legal notice it served a day earlier to the Group for launching what it called was a malicious propaganda campaign against the President.

The group published a news item in its publications about the supposed secretive marriage of President Asif Zardari. The story was based on a web based article of questionable credibility that was circulated on the Internet. The story was splashed by the group as an exclusive despite the fact that the lady in question had not confirmed the marriage and the spokesman for the president had rebutted it. Following the publication of the story, the president asked the group to print a contradiction or face a multi-million dollar lawsuit.

The presidential spokesman refrained to comment further saying “notice has already been served and decision is taken to pursue it. Further comments will be premature and perhaps unnecessary”.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 7^th, 2011.