One voice for freedom
The loosening of controls over the print media was initiated by late PM Mohammad Khan Junejo during his tenure. Since Junejo’s PM-ship was at the sufferance of the late dictator, Gen Ziaul Haq, the restrictions were only sparingly released. Press freedom came into full bloom in Pakistan during Ms Bhutto’s first stint as PM, much more than anytime in our history. On her part, as the greatest beneficiary of Press support, Ms Benazir remained benevolently tolerant of criticism. When she was downed the first time in 1990, the print media rose to her defence almost unanimously and carried on that vein through Mian Nawaz Sharif’s reign till she returned to the PM House the second time around, a honeymoon of sorts lasted for some time. However, being the unofficial guardian of accountability, the print media started to focus on inefficiency, nepotism and corruption in government, more sensitive to critical review this time around Ms Benazir has started to lean more on the Establishment. The chasm between her and the Press has deepened, the Establishment and a free Press being daggers drawn as sworn enemies.
Professionals like Hussain Haqqani and (now) Farhat Ullah Babar have kept the relationship between the PM and the Press going, but more times than not they have been circumvented by the mandarins who have successfully seen through every successive government.
Sensitivity to criticism is not a phenomenon confined to Pakistan alone. Former Singapore PM (and now Senior Minister) Lee Kwan Yew, is known to react badly. A man of outstanding integrity, having performed a miracle in transforming Singapore into one of the first rate economies of the world, the Senior Minister may be forgiven in not taking kindly to criticism that he views as personal. Given the fact that not only his honesty but of also those whom he has chosen to succeed him is beyond question, the curtailment of Press freedom in Singapore is not viewed with much concern by the populace, content in the knowledge that it has had a good deal, from an outstanding team of leaders in achieving a spectacular enhancement of the quality of life in the Island State. Therefore contempt proceedings, particularly against the foreign print media are a common occurrence and arouses no reaction among the masses. This is notwithstanding the fact with Lee Kwan Yew’s God-like status in Singapore, it is hardly likely that any Court would give a verdict against him, irrespective of the merits of his plaint. However, this has aroused world public reaction, the famous columnist William Safire even inviting Mr. Lee Kwan Yew to a public debate on Press Freedom. The Singapore model is much admired in Pakistan by those who are the target of media criticism, the only option previously available to the Establishment being to use intimidation by official machinery. However, given the political inroads made into our judiciary, there is reasonable doubt whether one could get the benefit of blind justice in Pakistan.
The trial of Emile Zola in the “Captain Dreyfus” case in France early in this century serves as a model example of how powers of the State can be used to subvert justice and cow down the Press. In the late nineteenth century France faced humiliation at the hands of Germany and had to cede the Sedan. Looking around for scapegoats, the French found a perfect fall-guy in Captain Dreyfus, a Jew who worked for the French General Staff. A note was discovered written to the German Military Attache and though the handwriting was in considerable doubt, was sourced to Dreyfus as the author. Dreyfus was arrested, tried and convicted to life imprisonment in Devil’s Island. His family kept on fighting for this innocent man’s release but though some of Dreyfus’ superiors who were in position of influence in the Army realized that miscarriage of justice had taken place, they kept on covering up, even sending one recalcitrant officer off on a special inspection trip abroad in order to keep him from disclosing the truth. The ironic part is that by this time they knew that a certain Major Esterhazy was the traitor who had passed the secrets to the Germans but in their effort to cover up the wrongdoing, they started to protect this man, even forging other papers to further implicate Dreyfus. In time, family and relatives of Dreyfus approached Emile Zola, the renowned French writer, to intervene by taking up public cudgels on the behalf of an innocent man condemned to spend the rest of his life in fetters. Listening to the flimsy and circumstantial evidence, Zola decided that Dreyfus was innocent and needed his help as the machinery of the State was involved in fabrication and cover-up on a great scale. He then wrote the historical manuscript, which former French PM Clemenceau labelled as “J” accuse…! (I accuse) and which appeared on January 13, 1898 in the Parisian newspaper “L’Aurore”. To quote Philip Walker in his book, “Zola”, “It was everything that Zola had meant it to be; a pre-meditated provocation, a cry of anger, a brilliant expose of the facts of the Affair, an appeal to the humanitarian idealism which for millions of Frenchmen like himself still had the face of a religion”. For the first time the word “intellectual” was used as writers, poets, journalists, etc flocked to put their signatures in support of Zola’s counter-indictment.
Zola’s attack was meant to provoke those who had been involved in framing Dreyfus, among them Generals Mercier, Billot, the two war ministers involved in the case, with “either hiding the truth, deliberately lying or yielding to others. It accused the war office of conducting a despicable newspaper campaign to lead public opinion astray and hide its mistakes”. Emile Zola’s trial lasted 16 days in which he was not given the freedom “granted to murderers and thieves, they can defend themselves, they can call witnesses”. The President of the Tribunal, Delegorgue, suppressed any attempts of the defence to introduce new testimony, whenever Zola’s counsel, Fernand Labori, asked an embarrassing question, he was stopped from putting that question. The Courtroom was packed by military officers in mufti who constantly raised anti-Zola slogans, outside large crowds paid for by military intelligence also chanted anti-Zola slogans. This travesty of justice was stage-managed to stop the voice of accountability from being raised. The Jury men were intimidated by their names and addresses being published in newspapers, the results were predictable. Despite his final entreaty, “May my works perish if Dreyfus is not innocent”, Zola was found guilty by a vote of seven to five and he went off on self-imposed exile in England rather than face incarceration. However Zola had started a chain of events that could not be stopped, in his words, “Truth is on the march and nothing will stop it”. He said “it was a crime to exploit patriotism in the work of hatred, a crime to make the saber a modern God when all human science was striving to construct the great future edifice of truth and justice. When you bury the truth underground, it grows there, it acquires such explosive force that the day it erupts, it blows up everything with it”. In the end truth prevailed, Col Henry, who had master-minded the forgery committed suicide after making a full confession. Dreyfus’ conviction was quashed and a re-hearing of the case resulted in Dreyfus being reinstated with full military honours, even in the face of overwhelming evidence this took some doing. Most of the concerned military officers who were involved in the false persecution, telling lies and framing false evidence, had to resign. History has not recorded how many resigned on the moral grounds that they had knowingly participated in sending an innocent man to hell on Earth. Zola’s crusade for truth had not been in vain.
A free Press remains the greatest guardian of democracy as it holds individuals accountable for their actions. If a person in a responsible position in the intelligence services diverts secret funds to make a palatial house for himself, where is the check and balance in the system? While it may be true that sometimes Press Freedom is taken to be a licence for libel by some, for the most part self-discipline and morality governs the members of the Fourth Estate. To cater to those who resort to fabrication and falsehood, the laws of contempt hang as a Sword of Damocles. The Establishment’s normal penchant is to use official machinery to subdue its opponents but since it excites adverse public reaction, to turn to courts under the contempt laws, while using that part of the media that is under their control to carry out a public trial even before the case goes to court. The voice of freedom thus remains in thrall at the sufferance of those in power. A law meant to protect the citizens from being unduly persecuted by the media becomes a weapon to keep this freedom suppressed. Increasingly newly emerging democracies (NEDs) are looking at authoritarian role models that only allow sanitized criticism with kid gloves on to pose as democracies but get away by intimidating journalists and generally making life miserable for those who step over the fail-safe line.
Many journalists have spoken up in Pakistan against the chains of servitude, many have been jailed or suffered indignities in their quest to keep alive the torch of freedom. Certainly over the years the situation had become better in Pakistan when Ms Bhutto, as the champion of democracy, opened up the doors to the print media with respect to accountability. However, as her recent outburst has shown there are signs that the advice she is getting is directed against the Press freedom she was most instrumental in the obtaining of. This calls for caution as the forces of restraint have it in their power to manipulate the shutting down of this freedom altogether.
Among the many voices for freedom raised in Pakistan in the English Language Press, among them Altaf Gauhar, Humayun Gauhar, Kamran Khan, Najam Sethi, Shireen Mazari, Ayaz Amir, Naseem Zehra, Mushahid Hussain, M. B. Naqvi, Razia Bhatti, Ghazi Salahuddin, Amina Gilani, Nadira etc there is none more potent presently in its own category than Ardeshir Cowasjee’s. His column on Friday is read widely, photocopies are distributed. Well-researched and combining wit with scorn, his writing is taken to be reflective of the sign of the times and the general public mood. Irreverent he may be, inaccurate he certainly is not. Successive governments, none more than Jam Sadiq Ali’s, have felt his written rapier thrusts, the most tolerant by far had been the Ms Bhutto regime. No more! There is even talk of “sedition” in the air, of incarceration without trial, files are being shuffled in the bureaucratic haunts to contrive stratagem to shut this voice raised for freedom. The Chief Minister, Syed Abdullah Shah, normally a sensible, mature gentleman is even reported to have been heard murmuring about “shutting up this Budha Parsi”. Someone, somewhere is sore about the fulminations of Mr. Cowasjee, the minions down the line are scurrying to somehow prove they are “more loyal than the King”. Symbolically Ardeshir Cowasjee has become to Pakistan what Emile Zola was to France, so one must advise caution to those who want to suppress this voice. Can we smother the refrain about the public aspirations about raw accountability? What is ironic is that Ms Bhutto has been the fresh wind that ushered in Press Freedom, will this same wind run sour and uproot the roots of that freedom?
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