Long outstanding dues of advertising agencies: APNS condemns delaying tactics

The Executive Committee of the All Pakistan Newspapers Society at its meeting held on June 29, 2011 at Islamabad chaired by the Acting President Mehtab Khan adopted the following resolution: The Executive Committee of the All Pakistan Newspapers Society condemns the delaying tactics on part of various government departments and functionaries including the AGPR to sabotage the decision of Prime Minister to pay off the long outstanding dues of advertising agencies.
The APNS stated that for the last 3 year, the Prime Minister has been sanctioning special grant to settle the payment of its accredited advertising agencies for ads released in the print media during July 1, 2000 to June 30, 2008 and every time, these funds lapsed due to bureaucratic hurdles by the AGPR The APNS was of the opinion that the AGPR was deliberately attempting to damage the government - press relations.
The Executive Committee of the APNS called upon the Prime Minister to personally intervene and avert the looming crisis that the newspaper and advertising industry will be facing due to non-payment of these dues. The Executive Committee noted that the payment of these dues met the criteria set by the APNS and the Ministry of Information. The APNS reiterated that it has never insisted payment of non-genuine bills. The dues in question are based on invoices duly approved and verified by the PID.
The Executive Committee also discussed problems faced by regional publications of the Punjab, periodicals and the issues relating to Balochistan based member publication. The Committee was apprised that the government of the Punjab has curtailed its advertisements to majority of smaller publications and the ads are being released to publications on political and personal whims of the releasing authorities. The Committee was informed that the quantum of ads to Faisalabad publications has been further reduced. The Committee urged upon the Punjab Government to address the issues of smaller and regional publications.-PR