Familygate or Arslangate:
It has now been established that Malik Riaz Husain of Bahria Town approached a number of top TV talk show hosts in Pakistan and shared detailed information, videos and documentation about $3.7 million in illegal payments made to Arsalan Iftikhar, the son of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, over several years. Others, including Chaudhry Aitazaz Ahsan, knew about it and shared it with Justice Chaudhry a while ago. While rumors swirled among the Capital insiders, the public at large was kept in the dark until recently when a video of Shaheen Sehbai talking about it surfaced on Youtube and forced the mainstream media to finally discuss it on air.
Here's Shaheen Sehbai breaking the scandal on Youtube:
Mediagate:
Several behind-the-scenes video clips of a Dunya TV talk show leaked on Youtube reveal the television hosts appearing to be helping Malik Riaz Husain prepare his answers, and in certain cases even spoon-feeding him the answers.
The leaked video also shows a son of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and a daughter of Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) chief Nawaz Sharif calling in to try and influence the on-air contents. “Why don’t you start talking about it yourself, otherwise [if we ask] it will seem planted, which it is, but I don’t know if it should look planted,” says Ms Mehr Bukhari to Malik Riaz while Mr Lucman say that “I’ll say it on air that I’ve been "pressurised" by Mian Amir Mehmood (Dunya TV's owner) and Malik Riaz to do this program.”
Here's two-part Duniya TV's leaked video on Youtube:
Questions:
The fact that mainstream media sat on these stories raises serious questions about whose interests are its journalists serving? Why are they afraid to expose the top judges? What kind of illegal payments and other favors are they accepting from the rich and the powerful? How are the commercial interests of the media owners influencing the editorial opinions and news coverage? Are they trying to hide their own guilt? And to what end?
What's Next:
Free and independent media are often seen as an effective watchdog in a democracy. But the question being asked now is who's watching the watchdogs? One possible answer is that the new super watchdogs are the ordinary citizen journalists and bloggers who are active in the new cybermedia and not beholden to any special interests.
High-speed broadband expansion led by PTCL has propelled Pakistan to become the fourth fastest growing broadband market in the world and the second fastest in Asia, according to a recent industry report. Serbia leads all countries surveyed with a 68% annual growth rate from Q1 2010 to Q1 2011. Thailand (67%), Belarus (50%), Pakistan (46%), and Jordan (44%) follow Serbia. India is in 14th place worldwide with a 35% annual growth rate.
In spite of rapid growth, the level of Internet penetration is Pakistan is still low. In a population of 180 million, only 30 million ( about 16 percent) are connected to the Internet, according to Internet World Stats. It's enough Pakistan among the top 20 nations in terms of Internet subscribers. And Internet use in Pakistan is growing at a rapid rate, particularly in urban centers where 40% of the population lives, which are also home to the middle class which often forms the backbone of mass-scale uprisings. Mobile Internet use shot up 161 percent in 2010 alone.
Summary:
I believe Pakistan is entering a new era of the Internet media. And I hope that the new social media will continue to enjoy sufficient freedom and growth to provide wide enough access in Pakistan for the citizen journalists to play their role as a watchdog where the mainstream commercial media fails. Sunlight is indeed the best disinfectant for the rot that characterizes Pakistan's power centers today.
Related Links:
Haq's Musings
Imran Khan's Social Media Campaign
Culture of Corruption in Pakistan
Pak Judges' Jihad Against Corruption
Pakistan Rolls Out 50Mbps Broadband Service
Mobile Internet in South Asia
Media and Telecom Sectors Growing in Pakistan
Internet Service Providers of Pakistan
Chaudhry is No Angel
Justice Chaudhry's Address to New York Bar
Incompetence and Corruption in Pakistan
Zardari Corruption Probe
NRO Amnesty Order Overturned
Transparency International Rankings 2011
2 comments:
Here's an Op Ed by Pak journalist Mazhar Abbas published on CPJ Blog:
With ratings driving the profits of media channels, journalists and political talk show hosts are being motivated to stir up controversy at any cost. Meanwhile, the professionals who believe in credibility, objectivity, and honesty as essential parts of ethical journalism are becoming sidelined.
This corruption within the media is spreading like a cancer, and there seems to be no antidote. If it is not checked, it could prove fatal for the media industry. We must take steps to address this problem ourselves. If not, Pakistan's journalists could lose the credibility they have earned from years of struggle.
Earlier this month, a video recording of the off-air conversation between two prominent talk show hosts on Dunya TV was leaked. The hosts, Mubashir Luqman and Mehr Bokhari, were speaking to controversial real estate tycoon Malik Riaz in what was purported to be a confrontational interview broadcast on-air. But the leaked video showed the hosts off-air agreeing to questions, discussing questions to be planted, and talking on the phone to government officials about how to construct the debate.
The video appeared on YouTube [here and here, both in Urdu] a few hours after the show aired, and generated a huge debate both in print and online media about the hosts' credibility. Dunya management claimed there was a conspiracy to defame the channel and ordered an internal inquiry. Bokhari, meanwhile, struggled to clarify her position and denied involvement. Luqman was fired because of the insulting remarks he made about Mian Aamir, the station's owner, that were broadcast in the leaked video.
All 17 of the Pakistani Supreme Court's justices took notice, too. They watched the recordings in the presence of Abdul Jabbar, chairman of the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority. It was not an official proceeding, but Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry questioned Jabbar about his inaction over the interview, the leaked video, and other TV programs ridiculing the judiciary.
Even while the consensus within the Pakistani press was that the credibility of broadcast media had been brought into question, talk shows' viewership went unaffected. This was no surprise: In the past, hosts fired from one station went to another, often with a much higher pay package.
Are these the norms of our society? While controversies, real or staged, often help the popularity of the channels and the anchors, such serious and blatant abuse damages their credibility.
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The problem is clear: The media has failed to establish any professional standards or rules of conduct for journalists, editors, or outlet owners. There are no professional organizations like bar associations or engineering or medical councils. There have been very few instances in which any media group or press organization has taken action against its members for violating ethical standards.
It is time for our profession to set some basic rules of conduct, which we will have to enforce ourselves if we want to keep our standing in the public's eye. The time to begin is now.
http://cpj.org/blog/2012/06/can-pakistans-corrupt-media-be-checked.php
Here's ET on Facebook and Linked-in user population in Pakistan:
Users of social networking website Facebook in Pakistan have crossed the eight million mark, revealed statistics provided by Social Bakers. The number of Pakistani Facebook users stands at 8,008,720.
The steady increase in users has put Pakistan at 28th place in the ranking of countries that use Facebook.
The highest number of Facebook users (more than 160 million) is in the United States, followed by Brazil with more than 63 million and India with more than 62 million users.
According to the statistics, the total number of Facebook users in Pakistan grew by more than 1,383,900 in the last six months.
The statistics revealed that the age group with the highest number of Facebook users in Pakistan (3,990,800) lies in the age bracket of 18-24 and the second largest group in the age of 25-35.
According to the data, more men use Facebook in Pakistan than women.
Around 70% Facebook users are male, while 30% are female.
LinkedIn
The number of LinkedIn users in Pakistan has reached 1,472,143 (more than one million), as revealed by Social Bakers.
Pakistan stands at rank 10 among all countries that use LinkedIn.
http://tribune.com.pk/story/486676/pakistan-crosses-8-million-facebook-users/
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