'Dark era' for media is over, claims minister

Minister for Information and Broadcasting Marriyum Aurangzeb on Tuesday said the four-year “dark era” for media and journalists was now over as the coalition government had allowed full freedom of speech.

Briefing the Senate's Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting, she said the incumbent government fully believed in media and press freedom.

During the last year of Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) rule, neither any channel was closed nor any programme was off-aired, said the minister. "No one now breaks the noses or the ribs of journalists."

Responding to a query of Senator Faisal Javed, who presided over the meeting, she asked him to "bring facts and figures and then talk". The present government, she said, had not filed cases against any journalist under the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act. "Who had placed a media ban on Nawaz Sharif? Who arrested Irfan Siddiqui at midnight?", she asked.

When Faisal Javed Khan claimed that some news channels were blocked during the past year, the minister challenged him to give the name of the channel which was closed. However, the committee chairman failed to give any information in that regard.

Senators Irfan Siddiqui and Waqar Mehdi proposed that media house owners should be called to the meeting to get a first-hand comparative analysis of media freedom during the tenure of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf and the PDM. Siddiqui said he was a witness to the previous government's victimization and also a victim. 

Published in The Express Tribune, April 12^th, 2023.