Pakistan Media Development Authority to affect every citizen, says PFUJ

Rejecting Pakistan's newly proposed media laws, the journalists Union of the country have termed the Pakistan Media Development Authority (PMDA) as an effort to suppress the voice of independent media and deprive people of their right to know.

The Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) and Khyber Union of Journalists (KhUJ) on Monday announced to support the PFUJ's scheduled long march from Quetta to Islamabad, according to The News International.

It reported that a convention arranged by PFUJ, KhUJ said that the members of the human rights organisations, civil society and lawyers would participate in the march, which would be taken out in the first week of November.

Speaking on the event, the central leader of Awami National Party (ANP) Haji Ghulam Ahmad Bilour, said "a non-political person had been imposed on the nation and the present rulers had come into power with the power of media."

The veteran politician said the inefficient rulers had pushed the country towards destruction. He said they would stage a hunger strike against the inefficient rulers from Thursday.

According to PFUJ President Shahzada Zulfiqar, the PMDA was not the problem of journalists alone as it would affect every citizen. Through PMDA, he said, media martial law was being imposed, which could not be and would not be accepted at any cost.

Despite being a democratic state, Pakistan continues to suppress free speech in digital spaces, stopping its citizens from participating in the working of the state by depriving them of a resourceful channel for vocalizing their concerns.

Report 2020 by Media Matters for Democracy (MMfD) says that the country performed poorly in all the indicators that determine free speech and that the COVID-19 pandemic further exacerbated the digital censorship in Pakistan.

Pakistan scored 30 points out of 100 on the assessment report index, which analysts say proves the fact that the government has placed curbs on free speech and disallowed people to talk especially about the pandemic and the related information. .

( With inputs from ANI )

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