Facebookers and bloggers fight Pakistan emergency
* ‘We Oppose Emergency in Pakistan’ biggest Facebook protest group from Pakistan
ISLAMABAD: Defying a growing crackdown on dissent by President Pervez Musharraf, young Pakistanis are using blogs and social networking sites such as Facebook to hit back at a state of emergency.
Plans for “flash” protests in Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore and other cities are being posted at the last minute to skirt a ban on all political rallies under repressive emergency laws.
The Internet has become a vital tool for them, with the government shutting down the country’s biggest two private television news channels on Sunday and rounding up thousands of opposition leaders.
“We are coordinating protests with other universities across Pakistan using Facebook, using blogs, cell-phones and text messages,” Ahmad, a student in his 20s from Lahore, told AFP.
He asked that his full name not be used in case he is traced by the authorities.
Protesters can face jail if found guilty of inciting unrest, especially since Musharraf ruled that civilians can be tried in army courts.
“We let students know through Facebook groups and blogs when the protests are taking place. We are having flash protests for five or 10n minutes so we do not get caught,” he said.
“But the authorities have also been monitoring movies that have been sent to CNN I-Reports so they can identify the students involved,” he said, referring to a interactive reports on the international news network.
So far most protests have been small, but last week they escalated when 3,000 students from Lahore’s Punjab university turned out for two days running to protest against the arrest of cricket legend Imran Khan.
Biggest Facebook protest group: The most popular Facebook protest group for Pakistan is “We Oppose Emergency in Pakistan”, which had 11,471 members as of Sunday.
One of its members announces a candlelight vigil in Lahore, giving just a few hours’ notice.
“This is the time when we the future of the country can act. It is our future that is in jeopardy and it’s our country that needs our support,” says the Facebook user.
The group has links to protest blogs, pictures of rallies and a mass petition (http://www.gopetition.com/online/15064.html) with nearly 16,000 signatures calling for the restoration of the constitution.
Users can also click on videos showing the final transmission by Geo TV and a recording made in hiding by Khan before his arrest.
Another Facebooker posts a link from the group to his own petition to free Khan, who was detained by police on Wednesday while trying to ignite a student protest movement against Musharraf – although it has yet to be signed.
Pakistanis have also turned to blogs as a political tool, with one (http://emergencypk.blogspot.com/ ) being the major premier alert service for demonstrations.
Internet use has soared in Pakistan in the past five years, with service providers saying between five and 10 million people among Pakistan’s youthful 160 million population are online.
Many have tapped into Facebook, the online phenomenon of 2007, which claims nearly 50 million active users and is by some measurements among the top 10 websites worldwide.
The site also came to prominence in building resistance to the crackdown by the military junta in Myanmar against mass pro-democracy protests led by Buddhist monks.
“Blogs and Facebook are starting to change the way young Pakistanis think because people who aren’t usually interested in politics are being exposed to it,” said Hamza Sadiq Khan, creator of the Facebook group “Go Musharraf Go!”.
The Internet was particularly important for some of the younger generation who were disillusioned not only with Musharraf but also with political leaders like Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, who have dominated the scene here for years.
But he added that most young Pakistanis still lived in rural areas with no access to cyberspace.
“So it can’t yet play a pivotal role, for that we need genuine political leadership,” he added.
Source: Daily times
Date:11/19/2007
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