Media breathing through ventilators

Media breathing through ventilators
By Sohail Iqbal November 01, 2007


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One year after his gruesome murder, the journalist community, particularly, in Islamabad demanded of the authorities to track down the killers of Ismail Malik and solve the mystery.
Mr Malik is still remembered by the journalists of Islamabad with whom he worked for more than 20 years. They still remember the humble, soft spoken and extremely friendly face of the veteran, who had no grudge against anyone. Despite being an independent reporter and critic for so many years, he was highly respected and quoted as a role model for the newcomers. Yet his untimely death and the initial phase of investigation raised several questions as to whether his death was accidental, a gruesome murder or a pre-planned killing.

The answer, or the path to solution, is probably buried in the files of police department and the investigation agencies.
According to a source in the police, the file regarding probe into Malik's death has been closed as `unsolved'. After initial investigations last year, police detained a few suspects from the place where his body was found. The suspects, though their detention and questioning by police was considered highly questionable, were released after a few days of investigation. Since then, the police have made no progress leaving many questions unanswered. There is a certain reason to believe that the lives of journalists are not protected in Pakistan. In fact nobody, apart from the ruling elite and their collaborators, is safe in Pakistan.
Starting from the president, prime minister and opposition leaders, and the elite of Pakistan is being given protection by the police. They enjoy all the protection while the rest of the population has been exposed to all kinds of dangers including suicide attacks, thefts, purse snatching etc.

Malik is not the only journalist in Pakistan, whose murder remains unresolved. There are many others who fell victim to unknown criminals but the government did nothing except lip-servicing in claiming the killers would be apprehended and brought to book as it believed in independence of media. Such promises were made by the government regarding the murder of Malik as well. However, at the very initial stage, the investigators started giving the probe a weird twist by suggesting that Malik's murder was a crime caused by immoral behaviour. The investigators had no reason to back up this claim but it was enough to close the probe. And so they did.
As the police and investigators at the intelligence agencies started twisting the facts in the murder probe, the journalist community can smell a rat. Malik's sons have been harassed and intimidated of dire consequences by unknown phone callers, on grounds that if they insisted on demanding a probe into the matter, they would be dealt with severely. The journalists of Rawalpindi and Islamabad, who knew him well, are not prepared to accept the police version that Malik was involved in immoral activities. He was an open person. His writings were clear and his thoughts were known to everyone. He was not a mystery man at all. He lived a most respectable life and he was comfortable with everyone as much as others felt at ease with him. Therefore, questions creep up when the police tries to give his murder a totally mysterious touch. And such method of investigations, which is actually meant to hush-up the matter, raises concern whether Malik's murder was yet another case of missing persons in Pakistan. The difference is that his body could not be made to disappear for certain reasons. Otherwise just as the Supreme Court of Pakistan is currently dealing with hundreds of missing persons, Malik was supposed to be one of them.

The journalist bodies, human rights groups and civil society of Pakistan are already concerned about increasing attempts by the Pakistani government to muzzle the media. In the past, the government has taken several unwelcoming steps to gag the press including curbs against television channels, harassing and kidnapping of journalists or reporters receiving threatening messages such as; `stop telling the truth or face the consequences'. The offices of the country's top television channels have faced violent attacks and pressures. The journalists have suffered torture and other physical attacks in many parts of the country. On September 29, more than 30 journalists were brutally attacked and wounded by police and intelligence agency recruits while they were covering the filing of nomination papers by candidates for the presidential elections. Several journalists haven kidnapped and killed in the tribal areas while trying to cover the conflict between the government and the local tribesmen. Could Malik's murder be linked to any of these or other incidents? If the police did not come out with a more acceptable account of his death, these questions will be raised and the journalist community would be forced into believing that this is the truth. If there is explanation for events or happenings, then speculation and rumours become the order of the day.
Human Rights Watch already places Pakistan among the lowly ranked countries where the media is a victim of state's high handedness. In October 2002, Pakistan was ranked at 119 out of 166 countries in the Press Freedom Index. By December 2006, this ranking had slipped to 157. The group maintains that although the government has consistently claimed that media in Pakistan enjoyed unprecedented freedom, the freedom remained limited to publications and television channels that support the government and President Pervez Musharraf personally. The group claimed in one of its reports that English language media, which is much more visible to diplomats and the rest of the world, retains more freedom to criticize the government than Urdu media. Similarly, broadcast media is given less leeway than print media because of the former's greater outreach, it has said.

While the human rights groups remain critical of government policies in handling the media, the Newsweek in its edition this month branded Pakistan as the most dangerous country in the world, above Iraq and Afghanistan. While the government denies the finding by the magazine, it remains a fact that Pakistan has never been in such a precarious position, security wise, as it is now. While the security agencies and the government use all their muscles in threatening media and working out ways to gag the press, they have forgotten their prime and constitutional responsibility of providing protection to the lives and properties of common people. While, the human rights bodies and journalist unions blame the security agencies for being responsible for the disappearance of several journalists, the average Pakistani citizen feels highly insecure just because these agencies are not doing the job they were required to do constitutionally and morally.

Ismail Malik's murder is a reminder to all independent journalists of Pakistan that freedom of expression that they want to exercise comes with a cost. And the cost could be as high as giving your lives for the cause. The probe so far into the murder of Malik is an indication that time to come is tough for the Pakistani journalists.