Council of Pakistan Newspapers Editors (CPNE) President and editor of daily The Nation, Arif Nizami on Wednesday stressed for providing conducive environment to promote investigative journalism in Pakistan. Delivering a lecture on final day of the four-day training workshop on "Investigative Journalism" organised by Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF) here at a local hotel, he claimed that state-coercive mechanism was not only intact but being used with full force whenever the government feels to do so.
"Government and its agencies often use carrot and stick policy to curb freedom of press while advertisements and press advice is another major impediment in development of investigative journalism in Pakistan," he said adding that situation was even more alarming in the provinces.
According to him, investigative journalism thrives only in genuine democracy where democratic systems are well entrenched, Parliament is fully independent and judiciary is strong.
Criticising the existing freedom of information act, he said, "it is more helpful in hiding then to reveal the facts".
Stressing need for enhancing professional skills of working journalists, Nizami said newspapers and news organisations should also devote greater resources to improve standard of investigative reporting and journalism in general in the country.
He felt that despite promulgation of press council act by the government, it was impossible to have self-regulation along with coercive regulatory government practices.
Working journalists, attending the training workshop from all over the province, inquired various queries regarding the measures being taken by the newspaper regulatory bodies and management of papers for promoting investigative journalism.
Comments
Comments are closed.