Some disquieting questions have been raised by the sudden resignation of Shaheen Sehbai from the editorship of The News amid a flurry of accusations and counter-accusations between him and the owner of the paper, Mir Shakilur Rehman. For one, why did Mr Sehbai catch the first plane out of the country for the US, where his family is based, even before the ink was dry on his resignation letter? Two, why did he deem fit to give interviews to the foreign press rather than hold a press conference in Pakistan and explain his decision? Third, why did the local media largely, though not entirely, refrain from reporting the news of his resignation or enlightening the public about the reasons behind his departure?
Mr Rehman has questioned Mr Sehbai’s professional competence in handling matters. Stories of “uncertain veracity” were published, says the owner, hurting the organisation’s “financial” interests and damaging its “reputation”. He implies that the editor may have had a personal axe to grind in publishing such stories. Consultation on “contentious issues” with the owner was totally lacking, says Mr Rehman. Considerations of the “national interest” were disregarded in publishing certain stories, he alleges. Senior government officials were deliberately “rebuffed” he says and so on and so forth.
In response, Mr Sehbai accuses Mr Rehman of succumbing to government pressure and leaning upon him to sack three offending journalists – Kamran Khan, Amir Mateen and Rauf Klasra – from The News. He says he indirectly “conveyed to the government” evidence proving that “the policy of the paper was very balanced, in fact tilted in favour of General Pervez Musharraf, not under any government pressure but because some of the things he was doing were right”. Mr Sehbai claims that “at least 50 editorials and over 100 Op-Ed articles over a six week period were cited to show that The News had no bias against the government”. He also rejects allegations of professional incompetence. The gist of his message is that “the government’s pressure on Mr Rehman is unbearable”, that is why he has charge-sheeted Mr Sehbai and forced his resignation.
On the face of it, such mutual recriminations are not surprising. Many such tensions are built into the relationship between the owner and the professional editor of a paper, with some owners mainly concerned about money matters and some editors obsessed with editorial independence. However, where the government enters the fray as a key player impinging on the financial health of a paper and the independence of an editor, as in Pakistan whether under civilian or military rule, sparks are bound to fly.
Mr Rehman certainly has many assets to protect or procure and cannot afford to irrevocably alienate the government. But he knows that the public will disavow his paper if it is less than fully independent. Thus he must constantly walk a tight rope between reining in an independent editor and succumbing to an overbearing government. A problem came up in 1999 when his editors ran afoul of the Nawaz Sharif government. Confronted with a demand to sack some journalists, Mir Shakilur Rahman stood his ground when the government’s henchman Saifur Rehman employed the most brutal methods to bring the press to heel. Eventually, maters were “settled” without sacking the journalists in question. Why wasn’t the same route possible in the current situation? Did Mr Sehbai’s resignation and departure preclude it altogether? Herein may lie some clues about what really happened and why.
Mr Sehbai resigned and left the country in a hurry because he feared that the government was readying to trump up some charge or the other against him. We don’t know whether his fears were justified — no such evidence has been presented. But the three journalists in question haven’t been fired by Mr Rehman, say sources, most probably in order to give the lie to Mr Sehbai’s allegations. Therefore it is irresponsible to claim, as his critics have done, that Mr Sehbai had made up his mind to quit for various reasons and sought an opportunity to leave with a bang rather than a whimper. Don’t we know concrete cases of Pakistani journalists being strangely silenced since the military government came to power?
Two years ago, an editor was hounded out of the northern areas by the local military commander. Last year a senior journalist was brutalised by masked men for writing unflattering stories about a serving general. Another was severely reprimanded by the newspaper owner after the government complained about how he had needled General Musharraf at a press conference. A photographer was imprisoned because he mistakenly submitted a photograph for publication that “demeaned the nation”. A local journalist disappeared for a couple of days some months ago after he wrote a story about official patronage of a wanted criminal. And so on. We know, of course, how government functionaries, including General Musharraf, have sometimes flown off the handle when faced with awkward questions from the press, and how “press advice” from Islamabad, coupled with advertisement leveraging, has become a matter of routine for some newspaper owners and editors.
True, the press is still relatively free and that is a plus point for General Musharraf. But the government’s shadow must not be allowed to fall on the press and the relationship should not be marred by the sort of circumstances that forced Shaheen Sehbai to flee to safety.