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August 10, 2006
Press – you never had it so good
It would be both naïve and foolish to say that the Press and media in Pakistan are wholly free and unregulated, because the uncomfortable truth is that mass-communication outlets the world over are regulated by the governments of the countries in which they operate –– the difference lies in the matter of degree, observes Chris Cork
Democracy and the people and politicians of Pakistan have always had a bit of an on and off kind of relationship, a love-you-today-but-maybe-not-tomorrow kind of affair. The kind of marriage that once arranged and celebrated works best when distances of intergalactic proportion separate the two parties. Pakistan is perhaps more in the ante-room of democracy than in the gentleman’s smoking lounge; quietly shuffling its feet and arranging its clothing preparatory to making a grand entrance.
There have been a few exploratory forays through the portals of democratic governance, but the generals who have bragging rights over the best armchairs in the inner sanctum have found the interlopers wanting in a number of key areas –– honesty, incorruptibility, fiscal probity and a complete inability to successfully run a market stall selling nimco all spring to mind –– and sent them off for a spell contemplating their navels and re-writing their application forms.
So a sort of vaguely benign military dictatorship has emerged as the governmental flavour of preference, at least on the part of the military themselves. The common man, inured –– well at least 35 per cent of them anyway –– to a life of grinding poverty and deprivation is more concerned about how he will feed and clothe himself at the end of this very day than the wonders of democratic representation. Those above the poverty line are busy making money or babies or both and have little time to spare to contemplate the wonders of voting for a criminal of your choice.
At the top of the pyramid are the politicians themselves, largely redundant these last seven years and who are themselves so penurious as to own neither house nor car if the recent declaration of their assets is to be believed. They are the paid performers of the Great Democracy Show, a soap-opera comprised of innumerable episodes and a plot so utterly enervating as to induce a coma. Despite this, they have international cosmetic value and are thus maintained, a collection of waxworks, by their military masters. The three diners agreed that there was unlikely to be a serious outbreak of democracy any time soon and moved on to altogether more serious matters. Like the freedom, or otherwise, of the nation’s Press and media.
Pakistan and the concept of the paradox walk hand-in-hand. Consider a moment, dear reader, the paradox of a prominent member of the MMA (the Me and My Amphibians party) who on the one hand condemns the Great Satan currently under the tutelage of G. Bush esq. and damns with every utterance Americans, their culture, their avariciousness and general greed, yet sees no difficulty in sending his children to be expensively educated in the very bosom of the beast itself. A paradox, a paradox, a most ingenious paradox…and thus it is with the Press and media in the country today.
It would be both naïve and foolish to say that the Press and media in Pakistan are wholly free and unregulated, because the uncomfortable truth is that mass-communication outlets the world over are regulated by the governments of the countries in which they operate ––– the difference lies in the matter of degree, and moreover the degree of overt or covert repression or violence that the state is prepared to use to regulate what is said about it. Compare Pakistan to China or Myanmar or Saudi Arabia or almost any of the central Asian republics, and the local media are living a life of untrammelled freedom. In the same way compare Pakistan to America or Europe and there is a clear gap ––– though a gap that may not be as wide as is sometimes imagined.
Those of you reading this of a certain age might cast your minds back to the Zia era…remember the blank spaces on the newspaper pages? The ever-present censor? Now compare that to today ––– and for a start there would not be a snowballs chance in hell of a piece like this making it into print. Take a look at the bicycle of any newspaper-seller anywhere in the land and see the plethora of publications, from the frequently barking-mad Urdu papers to the sober and sensible monthlies in Urdu or English, poke around in this pile of print and be amazed at the diversity of both quality and quantity that the nation has at its collective fingertips.
Pakistan is currently enjoying a print boom the like of which it has not seen for years. There are new newspapers appearing, new formats and ideas, new columnists and commentators, all with something to say to those who wish to exchange a few rupees for something as ephemeral as a newspaper. There is no obvious censorship, though some papers toe a ‘party line’ and there are areas that are rarely explored by the Press ––– but they are few, and overt government intervention is mostly manifested in the withholding of advertising from publications that have displeased it.
On the darker side there are well-documented cases of journalists being harassed or intimidated and in one recent notorious case, in all probability abducted and murdered by organs of the state. Various senior members of the government have voiced unease about the freedom of the Press, and hinted that freedoms won in a dictatorship are as easily lost. There is no doubt the Press in Pakistan is one of the freest in the subcontinent, and it has much to be proud of –– which considering that the three diners were all active scribblers for various newspapers is perhaps an unsurprising conclusion.
The electronic media have positively blossomed under the current regime. Deregulation has produced a diversity of television channels and the coming of FM has opened up the radio airwaves. Quality is variable between ‘decent’ and ‘abysmal’ but these are early days. What is clear, however, is that the electronic media are finding their feet as agents of social change, and a campaign led by a private TV channel with a debate on the Hudood Ordinances at its heart, was a timely lesson for all who work in the media as well as for those elected to serve their nation through the medium of parliament.
The vacuum left by the absence of real politics was in this instance filled by a media outlet, with an outcome that few could have foreseen –– the release of hundreds of women from the nation’s foetid jails. Whether this can be translated into a parliamentary act rather than a presidential ordinance is yet to be seen –– but the signs are not encouraging. What was encouraging was that the debate was open, free to access and you did not need to be able to read either English or Urdu to follow it –– in itself a small triumph for open governance, if by extra-parliamentary methods.
Those of us who document the faults of governance are sometimes accused by that same governance of being guilty of overlooking –– or wilfully ignoring –– those things that it gets right. There is much wrong with Pakistan. But there are some things that are right and some that are getting better, so let us all be grateful for small, and quiet mercies. n
The writer is a British social worker settled in Pakistan
manticore73@gmail.com
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