It is enlightening that, despite being rocked by continuing turmoil and even violent coups, Mrs Cory Aquino has abolished the institution of the Ministry of Information in the Philippines. In the longer-term interests of democracy and press freedom, the Philippino President is content to employ the services of only a press secretary and speech writer to present her views to the public. Regrettably, however, our own PPP government, despite many tall promises and claims, has failed to take a leaf from Mrs Aquino’s book and initiate similar emancipatory measures.
The repeal of the odious Press and Publications Ordinance was actually effected through a Presidential Ordinance by Mr Elahi Bux Soomro, the Information Minister in the caretaker government after Zia ul Haq’s demise in 1988. Since then, Ms Bhutto’s government has simply issued two Ordinances to keep the new order alive (RPPPO), but the National Assembly has yet to pass a bill making this the given law of the land. Such a situation is inherently capricious, therefore unacceptable, and the PPP government must immediately move to make secure this ad hoc arrangement.
The National Press Trust, too, is a revulsive legacy of martial law and we must insist that the PPP honours its electoral pledge to abolish it. There is no justification in a democratic system for such a Trust. Attempts to fob us off by alluding to the ‘problems’ and ‘mechanics’ of doing so are patently feeble and untenable. If there is a will, a satisfactory solution should not be difficult to find. The private sector should be seriously sounded out to help the government resolve any ‘problem’ attending the NPT’s dissolution.
The obvious lack of autonomy and professionalism in PTV and PBC also merit cognizance. We accept the right of the federal government to maintain these organs in the public sector, but with several important provisos. One, both organisations should be professionally manned, with recruitments, hirings and firings channelled through some autonomous and respected public body acting as a watchdog free from political influence. Two, the federal government must totally relinquish its monopoly over the electronic media and permit the establishment of an electronic network in the private sector at the provincial level. Competition will compel the public sector to purge inefficiency, highhandedness and favouritism, thereby providing for an altogether more neutral, relevant and exciting media.
We are opposed to the establishment of TV and Radio networks by the provincial governments for the same reason that we abhor the encroachments of the public sector into our private domains. Given the inherent and enduring political antagonisms between the provinces and any federal government, allowing the provincial governments to establish their own politically biased networks will further corrupt the media and preclude a meaningful and creative role for the private sector.
The government must also forego control over the disbursement of advertisements to the press. The Press and Information Department of the federal government has no business meddling in the affairs of the autonomous bodies and public sector corporations, which should freely determine their own advertisement policies. It is absurd to force us to hang on to the coattails of the PID and kowtow to its demands and press “advice” all the time. This argument applies with equal force to the provincial Directorates of Public Relations which play much the same role to curtail press freedom.
All this can be accomplished in one blow by abolishing the office of the Ministry of Information at the provincial and federal levels and all the tricks of the trade that go with it. By all means, tighten the libel laws in the country so that false and malicious press reporting is penalised. But remove, once and for all, the various devices utilised to keep the press in chains.
Sitting governments must not make the mistake, as always, of assuming that they will stay in power indefinitely. This PPP government, especially, should have a much greater stake in the consolidation of a democratic system and a free press than any government in the past 42 years for the simple reason that it depends crucially on such dispensation for its continued survival. It must realise that in the not to distant future it will have to sit on the opposition benches in Islamabad and/or elsewhere. That is when it will require the services of a free and vibrant press to air its views. That is when it will reap the fruits of what it sows now.