A search committee has been constituted to find and appoint a ‘suitable and eminent professional’ as chairman of Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA). Going by the measure of keen interest shown by the Supreme Court in the search process it is but logical to assume that the purpose of the SC is to liberate the regulatory authority from government controls.
Indeed, a liberated PEMRA serving as an autonomous statutory regulatory body would automatically acquire a level of credibility needed to enforce regulations without being accused of acting at the behest of its political masters.
The broadcast media has significantly shortened the distance between its practitioners and the consumers of news and views (N&V). The link is direct and often times in real time. This distance between the print media and the consumers of N&V on the other hand has always remained too long, ordinarily as much as 24 hours long.
This almost revolutionary change in the relationship between the producers and consumers of N&V has given rise to a number of professional and ethical issues.
Many among the producers and consumers of N&V are taking their time in adjusting to the new realities and challenges.
Citizens, when confronted by alternative policy options, are dependent on the media in order to formulate an informed decision
And it is becoming even more difficult for them to adjust to the social media which has obliterated even this see-through wall between the two.
In this new equation, consumers have become producers, and producers, consumers. Borders have become too blurred.
The generation of producers and consumers of N&V that grew up in the age of print tends to apply the professional and ethical standards of journalism of that period to what is called the ‘new journalism’ and naturally finds it increasingly impossible not to be troubled by the result.
Not that this generation was not already troubled by the impact of Rupert Murdoch’s rules of journalism and his culture of news on a major part of Pakistani print journalism. Alex Halperin reviewing David Folkenflik’s book Murdoch’s World claimed that Rupert Murdoch’s media vehicles had soared on ‘a center-right populism’ — punching up at elites, identifying targets of derision and trying to take them down mixed with lively diet of entertainment news and all kinds of coverage of sports, and treatment of politics often as sport — at times as blood sport. This, unfortunately, has over time become the mission statement of most of our print and broadcast tycoons.
Meanwhile, overall decline in educational standards in the country, steep rise in illiberal academic and political environment and expanding network of madrassa system had dinned a totally reactionary mind-set among most of our producers and consumers of N&V.
It is the sum total of all this that is reflected today in the N&V part of our private broadcast media.
There is nothing wrong with the mirror. The trouble is with the face. The ugly look does trouble many producers and consumers of N&V but not the media tycoons because the face, no matter how ugly it is, rakes in big bucks for these tycoons and also serves as a powerful political clout in their hands.
In such a situation, the only option left is to bring about peer pressure on the private media by liberating from government control, along with Pemra and Press Council of Pakistan (PCP), the state’s media vehicles as well — Pakistan Television Corporation (PTV), Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation (PBC) and the Associated Press of Pakistan (APP).
PTV probably has a reach of about 80 per cent and the PBC about 90 per cent which puts the two far ahead of the private channels and FMs in terms of reach. To make the peer pressure really effective and accord it a high moral ground, each of these bodies could be turned into statutory units each headed by a Chief Operating Officer (COO) to be appointed on merit by respective boards of governors constituted, in turn, by a bipartisan parliamentary committee ensuring that the boards have representation from a cross section of population including academics, lawyers economists, doctors, civil society members, trade unions, women and social scientists, etc.
The COO would be accountable to his/her board of governors and the board of governors would be accountable to the bipartisan parliamentary committee. Each COO would function within the limits of a mission statement evolved in consultation with the board of governors and approved by the bipartisan parliamentary committee. For self-regulation all these three organisations would develop comprehensive codes for ethical and professional conduct and strictly adhere to them.
And freed from government control Pemra and the PCP would become highly effective regulatory authorities simply because the gamekeeper would not be seen any more as the poacher by private broadcast/ print media practitioners.
Autonomous media regulatory authorities serve as public service watch-dogs. In many countries the ties between government and media get too close. Such links can be forged through advertising or some form of state subsidy to the media, or simply through the relationships between political elites and media owners, but the effect is frequently the same: ‘captured’ media that does the bidding of elites and thus is not truly free.
When the media get captured by those they are supposed to oversee they cannot or will not perform their critical societal role. Even where preemptive censorship no longer exists it is possible for formal press freedom to coexist with substantial political influence on the media. This influence has political outcomes.
Citizens, when confronted by alternative policy options, are dependent on the media in order to formulate an informed decision. When one of those options goes against public interest but holds a significant benefit for powerful interest groups, there is a risk that those interest groups will persuade or pressure media owners and managers to sway coverage in favour of the option that goes against public interest. This form of collusion between powerful interest groups and the media is more likely in societies controlled by extra-constitutional forces. Intelligence agencies and military are also perceived to have a stronghold over the rights of freedom of expression and access to information.
The writer is a senior journalist based in Islamabad. He served as the Executive Editor of Express Tribune until 2014
Published in Daily Times, April 19th 2018.