ISLAMABAD, Aug 24: The Pemra Amendment Bill 2005, permitting cross-media ownership which has outlived its mandatory 90 days life in the Senate since the National Assembly passed it in mid- May, is now awaiting scrutiny by the mediation committee of the two houses of parliament, officials said on Wednesday.

The mediation committee, having eight members each from the Senate and the National Assembly, was introduced in the Constitution under the Legal Framework Order (LFO) in August 2002. Previously, a joint sitting of the parliament had to be convened.

Asked if the Bill had lapsed having outlived its 90-day life since its passage by the National Assembly, a legal consultant of Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra), Ali Jaffar, said the Bill would have to be referred to the mediation committee as mandated in Article 70 of the Constitution. He said the Bill had not lapsed. According to Article 70 Clause (2), “If a Bill transmitted to a House under clause (1) is rejected or is not passed within ninety days of its receipt or is passed with amendment, the Bill, at the request of the House in which it originated, shall be referred to a mediation committee constituted under Article 71 for consideration and resolution thereon.”

Chairman Pemra Iftikhar Rashid told Dawn that cross-media ownership would not be allowed till the passage of the Pemra amendment bill. He said Pemra had given temporary permission to certain TV channels for uplinking.

Asked about certain coercive powers proposed to be given to Pemra through the amendment bill, Mr Rashid said a wrong impression had been created that police powers were being given to Pemra. He said police could be asked to take action under certain sections of the proposed amendments against offences mentioned in the Pakistan Penal Code. He said the new powers to be given to Pemra would be used to check the broadcasting of vulgar and obscene programmes by cable operators.

The chairman Pemra said the amendments had been scrutinised by a standing committee of the National Assembly and referred to the Senate after the lower House passed it.

Asked about a motion signed by 80 senators calling for including stakeholders in the debate on the amendments, the Pemra chairman said Senate was a supreme body and he would welcome whatever decision was taken by it in this regard.

Certain provisions of the Pemra amendment bill came under flak from the Parliamentary Commission on Human rights, whose chairman MNA Riaz Fatiyana wrote a letter to Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz appealing for repeal of coercive powers of the regulatory authority.

When the amendments were passed by the National Assembly in mid-May, the opposition parties and media watchdogs accused the government of attempting to curb media freedoms through the bill, which contained provisions empowering the police to arrest the broadcasters and licensees.

Media law and policy adviser of a global media organization, Matiullah Jan, said the Bill was passed by the National Assembly through a faulty process and contained factual inaccuracies which amounted to misleading the House.

Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) and International Federation of Journalists had also expressed concern over the amendments to broadcasting laws through the bill, which threatened freedom of the media and basic fundamental rights of the citizen and urged the government not to pass the bill without holding negotiations with journalist bodies and other stakeholders.

Sources in parliament said the president was yet to formulate rules for conduct of business of the mediation committee. The president is obliged to do this in consultation with the speaker of the National Assembly and the chairman Senate.