Ex-servicemen body supports Pemra’s restrictions

Malik Asad Published April 8, 2019

Pemra has imposed restrictions on the appearance of retired military officers on TV talk shows. ─ Dawn/File

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Ex-Servicemen Society (PESS) has supported the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority’s (Pemra) decision to impose restrictions on TV channels over inviting retired military officers to their talk shows and other programmes as defence analysts.

A statement issued by the PESS on Sunday said that the society distanced itself from a decision taken by the Ex-Servicemen Legal Forum to challenge in court the Pemra’s directives that retired officers take permission from the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) before appearing on television.

Retired Lt Col Inamur Rahim Khawaja, convener of the Ex-Servicemen Legal Forum, told Dawn on Saturday that his group had decided to challenge the Pemra notification in the Islamabad High Court.

The PESS reiterated that the ISPR director general was the only voice of the armed forces. The decision was in national interest and the PESS stood behind it wholeheartedly, it added. According to the society, it has three million members.

The PESS disassociated itself from any ex-servicemen forum which did not agree with this decision. “Such forums/groups only wish to serve their own vested interest and that of their paymasters,” the statement said.

In a notification issued on Thursday, Pemra instructed all TV channels to seek prior clearance from the ISPR before inviting retired military officers on news and current affairs programmes “to solicit their views on matters of national security”.

The notification stated: “It has seriously been observed by the concerned quarters that retired military officers are frequently being invited in different news and current affairs programmes / talk shows as defence analysts to solicit their views / opinions on matters of national security and related affairs. Such invitees are usually not fully conversant with latest defence and security related developments due to their service background and post retirement time. Moreover, the discussion mostly switches from security-related matters to politics which inadvertently embroils military officers into political debate which is felt undesirable.”

The Forum is an association of retired army officers-turned-lawyers.

Mr Khawaja said that there were five associations and forums of retired officers and soldiers of the country’s armed forces and his Forum was one of them.

Published in Dawn, April 8th, 2019

Newspaper

Malik Asad is an Islamabad-based reporter for Dawn with two decades of experience covering legal affairs, judicial developments, and the civil bureaucracy. He can be found on X at @asadrp.

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Regulator’s role

TV shows must seek clearance from ISPR before inviting retd military officers: Pemra

Hafeez

Apr 08, 2019 10:15am

Very unfair and against freedom of speech.

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Masood

Apr 08, 2019 10:19am

Pemra decision is correct, Col Khawaja represents nobody!

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SHAHID SATTAR

Apr 08, 2019 10:32am

Every government which comes into power devises means to outsource the available resources for building a binding to it and reliable vote bank for the coming times. The previous governments did the same and the current Ehsas program is a continuation of the same process which was formed and followed earlier. The tragedy is that in a society like ours, the monies allocated are given to undeserving political leaders who are only interested in their own personal clout, for which they have free access to the nation's wealth and they are hardly ever held accountable for their misdeeds.

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Solat Amin

Apr 08, 2019 10:40am

Excellent move, since they had nothing to analyze in terms of defense except internal politics, foreign policy and economics. I hope Pemra can sustain this decision for a longtime.

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Umair

Apr 08, 2019 11:17am

Why ISPR is putting onus onto TV channels to obtain NOC from ISPR? If they want to prevent their ex employees from appearing on TV shows they should tell them to do so.

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Banda Ajiz

Apr 08, 2019 12:55pm

There should be complete ban on servicemen for getting any job as ambassador, head of corporate bodies, civil government institutions and other profitable positions at the civil sector. They are already paid very well with free house and many plots.

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