They kind of figured out the pulse any kind of resistence. I have two words for those who promulgated this ordinance ‘Sc_ _w Them’.

Yh once again mushi goverment showed how tue democracy working in pakistan and mushi is in favour of free media
@admin
Head of State (Mushi Khayani)
Executive ( President of Pakistan ) not police……

i think our president have got maximum of 3 months lets see how low he can go?

all channels will now be PTVs…
I think the Ordinance should have also made the channel to change their names to PTV1, PTV2, PTV3..:).

A wish…
All channels should respond by boycotting all government events for a day…
If the Ordinance is not retracted…
All channels should respond by boycotting all government for a week…
If this also does not work….
All channels should respond by shutting down for a day…
If this also does not work…
All channels should respond by shutting down for a week…
If that too does not work….
….

I will accept that my wish was not granted…:(

But, I hope that these steps make clear to those who think that Pakistanis do not deserve democracy that thsi is not the case…the dictator fears people and wants to hide news from them….the only people who do not deserve democracy is the one who is not feared by the dictator…no, our spirit has not been deflated to taht extent as yet…we still need to be repressed because deep down we are alive…
long live the nation…

Kalila

democracy in action!

musharraf is the gift which keeps giving. everytime you think the filthy man has had enoguh with our politics he jumps in with a stunt like this.

guys you must watch this video and also ask others to watch it….
its time to change the pakistan….. click on the address below….

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-854791386997728455&hl=en-CA

your efforts can change… participate in protests…. work hard for the judiciary….
judiciary will only give u your right in pakistan… these leaders wont….

I dont know why, every body is getting so upset on this PERMA ordinance. The highlights on this page have been twisted a little bit from the actual link given, as well as, I think it would be better if admin would have left it for us to decide that, whether this ordinance ir stupid or not, rather than just giving the verdict.

This is the reason that some of the TV channels were banned, as they started to give their own verdict on every opinion, rather then calling government and opposition personnel to the program to let them discuss the isuue, and let AWAM decide, who is right. AWAM is Mash’Allah intelligent and they can decide on their own, that who is right and who is wrong rather than these media tell them that who is stupid.

The verdict must be left to the audience.

Mush is now an undeclared king. Look at this ordinance. A clause in it states that nothing can be done to defame mush, who wants to defame him, the people want to know the truth, it happens all around the world in democratic socities; everyone including the president is questioned. Mush is really flying high these days. Shame on his accomplices, Shame on everyone who supports a tyrant like him. Plz read the article below that states that US forces will be in pak soon.

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/earlywarning/2007/12/musharrafs_woes_have_opened_a.html?nav=rss_blog

FOREIGN OBSERVERS to visit polling stations only with prior permission and not allowed to pay surprise visits.

They would not be allowed to ask from any voter whom did they vote for - no exit polls allowed.

THIS ELECTION WOULD GO DOWN AS THE MOST RIGGED ELECTION IN THE HISTORY OF PAKISTAN - no doubt about that.

Farooq Ahmed

See PTV - its giving goverments view

Read articles by

Nazir Naji
Irshad Ahmed Haqqani
Najam sethi

and many other journalists

they are presenting goverment’s views. What do you say about that. PTV is not Musharraf personal jagir - it is funded by tax payers.

So dont try to make a fool out of people.

MQM under barrel of gun forces GEO and ARY to give them time and on other hand is also involved in their banning.

@chussian,

I guess, the only thing i said in the above post of mine is that media should not give verdict and allow the audiences to decide, what is right and what is wrong, and that includes ptv as well.

I dont know, whay you are getting so upset. I think you are very sentimental, you should cool down before you put false allegations that I am trying to make the fool out of you.

We live in a society where people believe in violence and corruption. Now these forums and web sites has helped us to vent our frustration.
I sometimes wonder at what point people change there views about morality? I mean most of the people seems to be educated. We stil find people who support Mush, MQM and all the questionable actions taken by them?

@ Farooq Ahmed

and who is keeping this righ to decide if the media have given a verdict or not?

lets say some body in govt is doing an action that is not acceptable in a ny CIVILISED society, and if media points out that and give references and examples to strenthen the argument given, whats worng in that??

only argument DHEET allies of dictator mushrraf r left with is”" people shud not accep tthe rights of civllised societies in Pakistan”" what the hell is this??

when it comes to expenditures on luxurious palaces, bullet proof cars, VVVIP jets, farm houses of chak shahzad, Askari Villas, decoration of army house and president house and many more………similiarly for increasing prices of oil, food, and imposing taxes……..then they want to be up to date in 22th century…

and when it comes to Rule of law for every one and baout human rights, then dictaro and mafia tells us…ohh we shud not expect this becos we r living in probably 16th century…
its shameful that still there r few people who can be so BAY HIS and with out any sharam o haya that they can support this system of ZULM by this dictator mafia.

@Farooq Ahmed,

if that includes PTV as well…how come it was not banned?
Does it not show that the issue was not that the channels were giving their own verdict, but what verdict were they giving. If these same channels were praising the government in their own verdicy, they would not have been banned.
Also, please come up with evidence for your assertion. i do not recall a single programme on Geo where only opposition was called to speak. The Afghanis, the Zafars, the Mushaids, the Kasuis and the well known Durranis were always present on these channels. Come up with evidence and argument for what you are saying.

Let me also add one more thing. In the Uk, newspapers are known for their verdict. Times is pro-conservative, Guardian is leftist and suppports labour, for example. In the US Fox TV is blatantly Republican and gives its verdict in favour of Right wing. So, what do these goverments dom close down channels?

And there is another issue, if the verdict these channels were giving was wring, how come people were glued to them and not to PTV, which as you acknowledge was also giving verdicts? You say taht the awam shopuld decide. The popularity of these channels was a decision of the awam. It was precisely thsi decision of the awam that Mush/army could not bear for long.

Please come up with concrete thoughst and not coward attempts to potray yourself as neutral. Between dictatorship and democracy, between zalim and mazlum, between, violence and non-violence there is no neutral ground.

Kalila

@ kalila

good points made.

and well said abt being in neutral.

HAQ oar BATIL ki jang mein koi NEUTRAL nahen hota..r u with HAQ ..and if not , then automatically u r with BATIL

@Farooq Ahmed,

Sorry, i could not stop myself from writing again…

starting from Musharraf coup in October 199, continuing with his false promises to shed uniform, the farce referendum, the rigged 2002 elections, the use of NAB to create PML Q, the dubious privitisation, the war on Pkaistani people in Waziristan, Swat, Baluchistan, the fiascu in Lal Masjid, the unaccountable debacles such the bridge in Karachi, the unconstitutional ‘emergency’, the waste of billions of ruppes on investigations on BB and subsequent deals with her, the sugar and the wheat looting…yaar kahan tuk sonogay, kahan tuk sonay…

The point is this, what does it mean for media to be neutral? That it should not have talked about any of these? If you can list an equal number of - or even one-third - government’s achievement and show me that the media did not cover it, i will take your point. But with governemnt at fault on so many things, neutrality itself demands that a negative verdict ought to be given.

and one lst thing, I recall that when the government was trying to pass the women’s bill, these private channels had supported taht effort. Geo had run ads, done programmes like Alif….at taht time too it was giving a verdict. Why were these channels not banned then? When the government had tried to do a good job, like in the case of women’s bill, the channels had supported it.

Please open your eye and feel the pain of all those who have suffered by the impact of the list of government’s crime taht I have listed.

I await your specific and to the point reply…

Kalila

It shows how lame musharaf mafia is. He thinks that his crimes are unaccountable.
boycott fraud election, boycott mush marshall laws.

@kalila,

You have taken the argument to a totally different direction and started to portray what you think about the Musharraf administration, rather than staying on the main point that we are actually discussing the PEMRA ordinance rather than we are talking about Musharraf regime.

You may be right for most of the crimes you counted above, but, if we start talking about the administration, there are so many crimes that were done by NS and BB governments as well, which were so called Democratic. I think, you are going to blame Musharraf for those crimes as well.

We talk about the 1999 coup, and after NS was overthrown most of the people in Pakistan distributed sweets and now the same people have just one point agenda Go Musharraf Go !!!, which shows that whic ever governemt is in power, there are always some people who just want to over throw the ruling government, whther its NS, BB, Mush, etc….

Even though I was only talking about the PEMRA ordinance, but as you have already taken the discussion to a different direction and asked me to give you some acheivemnts of Musharraf.

Musharraf ruled in post 9/11 world and After 9/11 Uk bombing, Philippine bombing, Spain bombing, Indian train bombing, Russia unrest, turkey, several shooting in American school and workplaces, Saudi Arabia killing intaha pasand.Every other day bruit, Jordan hotel bombing, Palestinians killing each other, no talking about Iraq, last but not least al jazahir.The list goes on and on.I agree with you it’s not an excuse that “Intaha Pasandi”{militiancy} grows in Pakistan, the government should be accountable for this.The point I’m trying to here is that where were we standing five years ago on economic front?”Pakistan is on the verge of bankrupt with over 30 billion foreign debt by late 1990. “{By infopolice.com} By 2000 reserves were three billion , and now they are sixteen billion.IMF in his world economic outlook{April 2004} writes “Strengthening economic growth in Pakistan.”Asian development outlook” In Pakistan Macroeconomics fundamental and Pakistan excomic recovery.JP Morgan{January 2004} rights “Wide-ranging reform initiated in 1999 presented an astonishing turn around and credit fundamentals of Pakistan.”The ABN Amro Bank {January 2004} , “After several years of consultation we believe Pakistan is posed for acceleration in growth because of favorable policy step taken.”Finance Asia{February 2006} “In every ratio Pakistan is beating the best figures.”Euro week”Pakistan has an improving economic story with all the indicators going into right direction.”The list is very long, I can not go on and on and on. Those have no brain believe on opinions not facts are just another example of the pessimism,siynicisim, and opportunism.The exist in those who refer to those who face the reality. ECONOMIC GROWTH:1960’s=6.8% 1970’s=4.8% 1980’s=6.5% 1990’s=2.6% 2000’s=7.5% STOCK MARKET: the first four years of 21st century Pakistan KSE 100 index was the best performing stock market index in the world.Reported by international magazines business week. POVERTY: 35% in 2000 down to 24% {world bank reporting} WORLD ECONOMY: The world economy expanded by 5.4%. China and India together averaged 9.2%. China, India, Vietnam averaged 7.4%. Pakistan 7.4%. GNP:Per ca-pita income Pakistan 11% UP.Late 1990’s 1.4% UP. USA 13% UP. GDP: Rising 16% in 2003-2004 to 23% in 2006. FRDL act 2005 adding 1.8% of GDP to the existing 1.7% of GDP on education in next five years. Literacy rate recorded in PHS{2001-2002} and PSLM {2005-2006} 9% increase in just five years.Net enrollment rate{NER} 2001-2002 was 42% 2005-2006 52%. TAX RECOVERY: 1999=15% 2006=37% Rupees 210 billion collected. The biggest tax recovery in the history of Pakistan. FDI: Foreign direct investment grew 37%.Only in the first nine months of 2007 they grew 276%.

If the developing countries want to keep their head above the water, the only way to survive is to bring FDI, which was tremendous in the last five years, because of the right policy.If someone very stubborn, and who is an idiot, and does not believe these facts, then go to wikipedia, which is known for facts and true facts{?wikipedia.org/wiki/economy_of_pakistan}.I challenge all the reader to spend twenty minutes on this site. I don’t give a damn to free media, emergency, dictatorship, compromise election, strikes, jails, above or under the law, judiciary.

If we had not done economic growth in the last five to seven years we would have no country left for these things. Once we are strong economically, every thing else would fall by it self in the right place.

This is only the achievements in the economic area, which media didnot show at all. Whereas, I was in India last month. Over there people are in more misery as compared to Pakistani, but their media propagates Nationalism, unlike our media.

You only asked for couple of acheivements, and I have listed them, hope this would satisfy your apetite.

@Farooq Ahmed:

Only one sentence covers all. Its not all FDI, you have to tell how much we got in Aid from America. Even Newyork Times and Washington Post is talking about zero audit. Wikipedia is not authentic and you know that. List the industries which have developed in Pakistan? List the progress made in education sector and health. Don’t give me number about Fake Universities

No body is saying NS or BB is angel. You have to tell me why its always politicians caught in corruption? and if we don’t here about billions made by generals and their sons?

Why now some body ask Akthar Abdur Rahman? and Hamid Gul and many others?

At least when a political govt disappears, the next govt tells you about the past corrupt politicians? why not same is done for Generals?

@econfused,

In my opnioin, every body should be accountable, but when I see people on this forum regard NS and BB as saviour and Musharraf a devil. I get so annoyed on their hypocrisy. I bet, if NS or BB won more seats in this upcomimg election, they will take back Pakistan back to stone age.

I think, it is very naive of you, not to belive all these numbers, as they also appear in lot of other reputable magazines and websites as well. here is another link.

http://www.heritage.org/research/features/index/country.cfm?id=pakistan

@Farooq … this is what I was trying to explain on my post here that no matter what topic is going, you will drag NS and BB into that. Admin

Forget about media, civil society, justice and social valuesuntil we get to the real problem.
The army establishment is real cause of all the ills this country has faced.
Blaming politicins is of no use.
That is one reason i liked NS stand. Today he said this jehlum.
This army establishment wants to get people frustrated with politicins so that they can implement their agenda.
PEOPLE SHOULD UNDERSTAND THE CAUSE OF ALL PROBLEMS IN PAKISTAN

@Farooq Ahmed

I disagree with you on almost all points. I’ll just take the FDI issue here. You need to be clear about what is clubbed under the head of FDI. FDI includes, inter alia, (a)investments in manufacturing sector, (b)investments in services and consumer industries and (c) investments as part of acquisitions and mergers. An example of (a) will be some new industry (e.g.: cement plant, power generation plant etc.) while for (b) the investment will be like opening a McDonalds or KFC etc. (c) type investment will be privatisation (e.g.: PTCL, Steel Mills etc.).

Of these it is only the (a) type of investment which is proven to have paid dividends to the local economy by generating new jobs and improving overall productivity of the local economy. (b) type investments simply kick consumerism and are known to have hurt local business by MNCs. (c) type investments are even worse. These tend to eventually end up in right sizing (loss of jobs) and reverse flow of capital (from local economy to the foreign investor). Better management, at times, results in higher productivity but it very rarely translates in mass uplift of local economy. What our beloved ex-commando and his coteries have been doing is to inflate the FDI figures by including privatization proceeds in it. This is just jugglery of figures. I am no economic expert, but I can see that no trickle down effect, and I repeat, no trickle down effect has happened in the Pakistani economy in last eight years.

I can take other points that you have mentioned one by one but if you insist on FDI then you have to show me in which industrial sector it has gone.

BTW: I am happy that regime supporters are now forced to talk about only economy as the achievements of this regime. A year or so ago they would also always mention ‘freedom of media’ as singular achievement. Good riddance.

regards,
inaam

@FarooqAhmed

First of all thank you for a detailed and specific note…it is a rarity on this forum…

now, let me try and respond…

you say that I have taken the discussion to another direction from that of PEMRA…
I do not think so…and this is why…
I was making two inter-related points…let me reiterate them.

The first was that giving verdict is a legitimate actvity of media the world over…I gave examples from other countries. If anyone disagrees with a particular channel’s position, the response should be to either show that the channel is biased or open other channels which would counter that verdict. There is a very strong leftist media in many countries, such as India, which criticise the pro-capitalist policies. But, you do not see these governments cloisng down the opposing media. The government of pakistan has its own media, the PTV. If it felt taht some private channels are giving verdicts against it which were unjustified, it could have opened more channels. It could have encouraged pro-government businessmen to open channels. This is how freedom of speech works. You do not silence the other by the barrel of gum but respond to words with words.

Further, by your standards, even this website should be closed bacause it can be argued that most people are writing against the government and the admn him/herself may be implicitly giving anti-government verdict. The correct approach would be to either bring more pro-government people to write on this website or to open other more attractive sites. It would be nothing but shameful if the website itself was closed. And this is precisely what the government of Musharraf has done.
You did not respond to this matter at all.

The second related point I made was that the verdict was negative because the government has been disappointing. I listed its failures. What can one do? Even the most neutral observer will say that pakistan is in a mess. It may have made some economic ‘progress’ (and I will come to it below) but it is in a mess in almost every other area. And I listed those areas. So, how can the verdict be anything but negative.

These were my two inter-related points. I argued that to give verdict is a legitimate media activity and that in our case the verdict could not have been anything but negative. I did not change the subject but went in deatils…

Now, on the isuse of deatils…let me go to your praising of economic development under Musharraf.

I am sure you would recall that immediately after October coup, Pakistan was completely isolated. Have you forgotted the 4-hour visit of Clinton? What FDI was there between Oct 1999 and Sept 2001? We were a pariah nation internationally.

It was only beacuse of 9/11 that Mush became acceptable and Pakistan came back into the international fold. And do not think that Musharraf - the adventurer of Kargil and the supporter of Taliban - had a change of heart. He had absolutely no choice. He himself has said that he was threatened that if he did not join the US, Pkaistan would be bombed to stone age.

So it was 9/11 and not any wise policy of Mush that has brough some macro-economic changes in Pkaistan. I am sure you would know the magnitude of US Aid, the flexible loans, the change of terms of existing loans better than I do. Please talk about all this as well.

I am using the term macro-economic beacuse all the figures you have quoted pertain to that. Now, as you know very well that macro-economics works on avergars and averages are deceptive. A country can have large GNP, higher exports, more reserves, all this without any improvement in the distribution of economic gains. You are only talking about growth and not distribution. Can you tell me who has benfited from these macro-economic growth? Are commen people better off? Are prices of essential items within people’s reach? which heavy industry has came to Pakistan? The FDIs you are talking about are all consumer items…the mobiles, dvds, cars, mp3s…and franchises… which are produced somewhere else and we simply buy them and give jobs and profits to MNCs. This FDI is so flimsy and supercifial that it can be taken away in the blink of an eye. It has only made Pakistan more dependent on MNCs and global capitalist mafia. Further, has this so called economic boom tarnslated in any way into social development? Is there any good government hospital for common people? Good schools? In fact, Madrsas have proliferated beacuse of the failure of successive governmts, incluging this one, to provide a decent education. If this government claims greatest economic progress it must also be able to show greatest social progress. Can it do that? The rich have become richer and poor poorer. That is the economic truth. The latest wheat fiasco is an example. Yes, wheat got exported and we came close to meeting export target but at whose cost? Who is now paying for the millions that Mush’s cronies made? Have you forgotten thae steel Mill privatisation? Who was benefiting? So please do not hoodwink people. As you had written peiple are now intelligent and they can see through.

Now, even if I grant that there was some debatable economic growth, how can one achievement be said to equal dozems of other debacles, especially in terms of huam rights? You are wrong to say that the channels did not talk about economic ‘progress’. They did. This is all that pro-government ministers were talking about; this is all Musharraf talked about in his ‘qoum say khitab’. But how can one balance a single debatable achievement with dozens of fiascos? A neutral observer will still say that compared to one debatable achiement there was so much decline. How can you equate some debatable economic progress with the loss of thosands of lives in Swat, in Waziristan…with hundreds of missing persons.

Finally, to criticise Mush is not to side with BB/NS. Please get out of this binary thinking. People like us are critical of all who have looted pakistan. We are for free speech and free judiciary and believe taht without these two pillars, it really makes no difference if Mush is in power or not. That is why I and many other have consistently criticised BB and NS.

Kalila

The days are near when people will through away the establishment along with its pets & soon genuine people will appear. For this corrosive stuff Jan8 is last s’election for them.

@Farooq Ahmed

“every body should be accountable”, how come when Pakistan is ruled by Military most of the time. We don’t see corruption cases against them. All the generals were angels? I vaguely recall Mansur ul Haq, but even his charges were dropped it.

Mansoor ul haq was forced to retire in civilian govermnent on charges of corruption

@Kalila,

I try to be very specific and short this time. About closing the channels, I agree with you that the gov, should not have done that. I have been banned from this website several times and I think admin and Musharraf share same mentality in this regards.

What I was saying that there should be an org. which will act like a watch dog and the ordinance given by PEMRA seems pretty reasonable to keep certain amount of restrictions on the contents and we see these kind of organisation in different developed countries.

Let me tell you why there should be restrictions. About 2 months ago, I was watching ARY World with my family, and without any WARNING they showed the dead bodies and remains of people and head of the suicide bomber who got killed in Karachi - Karsaz carnage. At that time, my niece, who is 6 watching tv as well. She got really frightened and scared after watching that. This kind of situation needs to be controlled.

About the isolation of pakistan, let me correct you. Pakistan actually got isolated right after the nuclear tests during the NS gov. and remained isolated until 9/11.

On one hand when it comes to the boost of economy, rather than giving credit to gov. we say that all happened because of 9/11. At the same time, when people get killed in NWFP and Waziristan, we dont admit that terrorism is growing in Pakistan as an aftermath of 9/11, but, we consider that as gov. inefficiency. Is this right? We should come out of these double standards.

About the Pakistan’s economy, I was in Karachi this summer. In my opinion Karachi’ economy has imporved as compared to 1999. In 1999 it was so difficult to get the job, but now there are so many oppurtunities in IT, Banking, Telecommunications sectors etc… as well as the pay scale is much much better. So I diasgree with you that the economical affects didnot trickle down to common people. I can give other examples too, which i have witnessed, but I want to say that, yes, there are lot of problems which still needs to be resolved but at the same time there has been some progress as well, that we should admit, and if we keep on going in the right direction, we will be able to resolve more problems. Its really our perception, if we see the glass, half full or half empty.

I completely agree with you that we should come out of this binary thinking of Mush or BB/NS, but at the same time we should not critisize each and every thing as this created pessimism, sinicism and disappointment.

@FarooqAhmed

Since you seems to be the official spokesman for murderer, lotas, people without any moral standings(PMLQ) and much more. So I am sure you must have a lot of reasons for the following as well:

http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/dec-2007/27/maxim.php

Last months, Mazhar Abbas Secretary-General PFUJ spoke in NYC at one of the seminars. His comments were that there is a lot more at stake besides the PERMA ordinance. Owners of the TV channels were also being forced to sign a paper that authorizes PERMA to cancel broadcast license at anytime.

This piece of paper like a hanging sword is what owners of these TV channels are scard off and now Govt is trying to remind them of this contract that they have signed.

Alright since @Farooq AHmed has been to Karachi and nobody got away with his cell phone and since he can find Job in Karachi All is well. He thinks media should be controlled, now the question is who gave the right to Musharraf to control what and how should be controlled.

Since Farooq is not not willing to talk about Atta Chors, Judiciary, then what is left to talk about. Now Mr. Farooq, how come Musharraf was not able to turn around things till 9/11 happened?

Why are you shying away from talking about Pak Army Generals? This Guy Mush goes on National TV and asks the western nation should not ask for Human rights for Pakistanis? You seriously think we are not human beings.

Name one thing this government has really build?

The last policy should actually state that:
“Prohibits television channels from broadcasting anything that exposes all the SOBs (Mush, the lotas, the farce and puppet judiciacy, the biased caretaker government and the list goes on)”