When Musharraf silenced the media
By: Mazhar Abbas
The writer is director current affairs Express News and has previously worked with ARY News. He is a former secretary-general of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists
On the evening of November 3, 2007, I was about to go live on the promulgation of the emergency imposed by General (retd) Pervez Musharraf, when a colleague informed me, “We are off-air throughout Pakistan”. It was the beginning of the 88-day movement against yet another ban on the Pakistani media — termed ‘emergency plus’ — which it has witnessed in its troubling 63 years of history.
As secretary general of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ), I knew I had a lot of responsibilities. After consultation, I called an emergency meeting of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) on November 7. The PFUJ vowed to defend press freedom against the military dictator, as it had done on previous occasions in Pakistan’s short history.
In the next 90 days, Musharraf’s government issued some very amazing notices to the channels and newspapers, copies of which are still in my record and for the first time would like to share with the people.
Two major cases were registered against the PFUJ leaders; one on charges of sedition and another charging the PFUJ leadership, 300 other journalists and members of the civil society with trying to enter the Prime Minister House by force. The FIR was later sealed.
All this was followed by numerous notices to newspapers and TV channels. Many people thought that General Musharraf banned the media on November 3, 2007 but the process had started much earlier when on September 28, channels received a show-cause notice stating that “No programme shall be aired which contains, (a) aspersions against the judiciary and the armed forces (b) any material amounting to contempt of court (c) contain any abusive comments that when taken in context, tend to or are likely to expose any individual or group or a class of individual to hatred or contempt.”
We knew that the ‘emergency plus’ was not against political parties but against the judiciary and the media, the two most emerging institutions in the post-March 9, 2007 struggle in support of the then-deposed Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Chaudhry.
We gave a 24-hour deadline to Musharraf’s government to lift the ban, failing which, we would start a protest campaign. By December, the journalists’ movement gained enough momentum to force the government to start reviewing the ban.
Not many, but some of the owners responded to us in a positive manner. By January, several TV channel owners agreed to our demand and signed a highly embarrassing ‘Undertaking’ of Pemra. The PFUJ had won the struggle.
Looking back, on November 3, I was threatened by arrest for protesting by an intelligence official. Today, I would be threatened by death if I raise my voice for greater press freedom. During that time, I was threatened by the agencies. Today, it would be the agencies as well as the extremists. But, even though the threat perception has changed, the struggle must go on.
In 63 years, over a hundred journalists have paid with their lives, several have seen prison and three have been brutally murdered for raising their voices in the media against sensitive issues which the establishment does not want to shed light on. We are ready for yet more activism but will not surrender.
Long live the struggle for press freedom.
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