World Press Freedom Day

Despite threats, Pakistani press is delivering a vital public service and has fast become a crucial agent of change.

World Press Freedom day is observed every year today, but there is precious little to celebrate in Pakistan. Press Freedom Day may be a calendar and diary date for governments to roll out platitudinous statements as to just how much they value a free press, but for many it is mere lip service. All round the world, the public’s right to know is under threat. Sometimes it is by direct censorship at others by the arrest and intimidation of journalists. In Pakistan, it goes beyond threats and intimidation. Journalists are killed with horrifying regularity, with a prominent TV anchor recently shot in his car as he travelled from Karachi airport. Thirty-four journalists have been killed in Pakistan since 2008. Prosecutions for the murder of journalists are exceedingly rare and the most recent pronouncement by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif that the government would do its best to protect journalists is little more than fatuous window dressing. All of the media houses are to a greater or lesser degree under threat and the journalists that work for them at hazard as they go about their daily jobs.

Killing the messenger is a tactic as old as messengers themselves –- but it rarely works and truth will out. But it is getting harder to bring truths into the light. The annual Freedom of the Press Index, compiled by Freedom House in the US finds that global press freedoms in general are at their lowest ebb for a decade. Of 197 countries surveyed in 2013 only 32 per cent were graded as ‘free’. Thirty-three per cent were graded as ‘not free’ and everything else fell between. Globally intelligence agencies seek to limit the freedom of the press to report their activities, and here in Pakistan ‘the agencies’ are allegedly active in attempting to influence or suppress reports of their work. Threats come from extremist groups as well and political parties are prone to killing critical voices also. Despite the threats, the Pakistani press delivers a vital public service every day of the year and has fast become a crucial agent of change. Threatened on all sides yes, but not cowed down.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 3^rd, 2014.

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