Journalists work under tremendous pressure
Myra Imran
Islamabad: Pakistani media is often propagated as being free, but the fact is that journalists continue to work under tremendous pressure.
The typical ways of the authorities to suppress press freedom are known to all. However, now the journalists are also being targeted by extremists and other groups. The law enforcement agencies, ministries, doctors, lawyers and even school teachers have threatened, beaten up or injured journalists.
There have been incidents of journalists having disappeared mysteriously and their bodies later found dumped by the road in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan and Sindh.
According to reports, 24 journalists have been killed since January 2008 with majority of them targeted for going out of the way to speak or search for the truth.
Journalists, especially those based in Islamabad in the 80’s, will tell you of the daily trips to the tiny censor office in Sitara Market late in the night to face a scary looking official who would go through the pages and marked off areas of the newspaper he deemed threatening to the perceived ‘pious ness’ of the Zia regime.
It is indeed a blessing for The News and its staffers to have one such hero between them. His very presence infuses the spirit of integrity and professionalism among newcomers in the media.
He needs no introduction in journalistic circles as he is considered an icon by everyone. He is Nasir Zaidi, incharge resource centre of The News. He possesses the treasure of all those memories that are truly inspiring for a journalist trying to understand the dynamics of Pakistani media.
Zaidi was an employee of the Associated Press of Pakistan (APP) in 1977 when, in the name of ‘fair play’, the military took over the reins of government and the longest and most unfair chapter in the political history of Pakistan began.
No matter how difficult it might seem now, it can’t possibly compare with the intolerance and high-handedness with which the authorities dealt with media rights and freedom in those days.
Soon after Zia took over, Musawaat, a Karachi-based newspaper was shut down for no reason. Journalists throughout the country tried to reason with the military to take back the decision but Zia and his generals saw this as an affront to their authority and came down with a heavy hand on those that dared speak up against them.
When the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) called for a countrywide protest, hundreds of journalists demonstrated. Many were arrested. This forced the PFUJ and the All-Pakistan Newspapers Employees Confederation (APNEC) to negotiate with the military regime and the latter, perhaps testing the waters, restored the newspaper and released the arrested journalists.
Then in March 1978 the regime shut down the Lahore edition of Musawaat. When the PFUJ and APNEC again tried to negotiate a settlement, the military was adamant.
Another call for launching a protest movement by the two media representative bodies was announced and got a huge response. Journalists started courting arrest at the Musawaat on daily basis.
By the end of May the regime had not budged an inch and rather than negotiate a settlement decided the journalists’ resistance needed to be met with an iron hand.
May 13 reminds us of those who stood up for freedom of expression as on this day in 1978, four journalists courted arrest at the offices of Musawaat. Nasir Zaidi was one of them. Others included Masood Ullah Khan, Iqbal Jafari and Khawar Naeem Hashmi. They were picked up from outside the Musawaat by the authorities and driven away in chains.
The four were produced before a summary military court headed by a young major and within minutes, he had not only completed his summary proceeding, but sentenced the journalists to imprisonment and flogging.
Within one hour of passing the sentence the four were flogged. Taken to the Kot Lakhpat jail, each man was stripped to his waist, spreadeagled and lashed five times with a yard of plaited leather thong dipped in oil.
“After the sentence was carried out, I was given the option of being taken out on a stretcher but I rejected it, preferring to show my captors that my spirit could not be broken,” said Zaidi, when asked how he had managed to walk after being whipped. All four were then taken to hospital in chains and manacled to their hospital beds.
Zaidi and his three fellow journalists were declared Prisoners of Conscience by Amnesty International. In 1989, they were given Pride of Performance awards by the government of Pakistan.
Thirty-three years on, this epic story is a reminder of how bravely our predecessors stood up to the might of a dictator.
Source: The News
Date:5/13/2011
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