Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Fawad Ahmed Chaudhry announced on Wednesday that the existing Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) and Press Council of Pakistan will be replaced by a single unified regulatory authority.
“The PTI government has decided to do away with PEMRA and Press Council and form a single, unified authority to oversee print, as well as electronic and cyber media,” Chaudhry told reporters during media interaction outside Parliament House.
The initiative looks like another austerity measure taken by the government to cut down costs, because the information minister said that ”this measure would help save national resources as the new regulatory body would look after electronic, print and social media simultaneously.”
Speaking about state television censorship, Chaudhry reiterated that his ministry has ended censorship of state media and the state television channel will broadcast whatever happens in the Parliament.
He also said that the public’s money will not be used by the government for personal advertisements. Slamming the rival Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, he said, “PML-N government sustained itself through advertisements.”
Talking on Maulana Fazlur Rahman’s bid for presidential election; Chaudhry said that everyone can see how serious Maulana is for presidency.
“For Maulana Fazl, the Parliament is ‘bogus’ and the votes are ‘fake’, but he wants to become president by obtaining votes from this same Parliament,” the minister remarked.
Published in Daily Times, August 30th 2018.