For all that the private, independent and fearless TV channels have been reporting and analysing about Pakistan in the last 15 months, since March 2007,there is every justifiable reason for the Pakistani viewer to contemplate about the future. What will happen in the days ahead? Are we in serious trouble and will these desperate times call for desperate, emergency solutions?
How long can the Pakistani citizen wait for any government to deliver? Given the kind of awareness that has been created by the TV channels, how long can the reserves of patience of the people last for the fulfilment of promises made in election manifestos, and Charters of Democracy and declarations that make concrete commitments?
In looking at the immediate future, for instance, and with reference to the Long March that is on (as I write this column on Thursday afternoon), I am amongst those who are wondering about its outcome? What will be the scenario in the country when this column is read?
I have been following the Long March with extraordinary interest and I wonder what President Pervez Musharraf is thinking of vis-a-vis its outcome. He spoke out his mind (did he?) last Saturday when he spoke to a select group of journalists (representing newspapers and TV channels). Significantly and intentionally (?) the Aaj TV was absent on the occasion.
I was disappointed that the TV channel, was kept out, and even today I am unable to reconcile with this kind of a policy where an important mainstream news channel was excluded when President Musharraf was to speak. It was good to see the confident, courageous stand that Syed Talat Hussain took on that very day. I have not seen any response from the relevant media managers of the President. And I wonder, whether, this policy of selective invitations (if it can be called that) will continue.
There is no point in recalling what the President said, seemingly relaxed, but somewhat repetitive. It has been reported and interpreted and his critics in all walks of life have accused him of "telling lies", and called for his impeachment.
When does he speak again, or was that his "swan song" as Nusrat Javed told an eager Mushtaq Minhas in Bolta Pakistan (Aaj TV). This is yet another politically powerful show that I have enjoyed ever since it began. The dialogue between the two journalists, from two different age groups, is often informative, and their spontaneous dissent adds many dimensions to the theme under discussion.
It is relevant to mention another political show (called Left Right), in which two journalists, Sohail Warraich and Anjum Rasheed appear on Geo. Their conversation is also very engaging. The format here is different as they have two subject specialists, and two themes for each programme. What the guests contribute also lends authenticity to the programme.
The two subjects last week were the future of President Musharraf, and his meeting with the media on Saturday, and the subject of phone tapping that various governments and establishments have done in this country. The participants were Mujibur Rehman Shami, and Hasan Nisar in the first part and Brigadier Yusuf (retired) and Hina Jilani in the second part.
LONG MARCH, BUDGET 2008-09: There is much to write on the subject of the Long March. The speeches and the slogans, and the enthusiasm that comes through in all the live coverage that we have been seeing on some of the channels.
Some channels have focused less on it, and more on the Budget 2008-09, which was announced by the Federal Finance Minister, Naveed Qamar and also telecasted live, on Wednesday evening. The discussion on it continues, and it is hard to believe that the average Pakistani is happy with it or is even trying to understand it.
There is simply a fear of prices that is prevalent and the coming days will reveal how the new prices will add to our woes. But the long standing perception that there are more anti-people budgets than just the federal budgets is something that stays.
Now it is not just at Federal Budget time that prices go up. In September 2008 comes Ramazan, and that is another price-rise time; but between Ramazan and June will also be a tough financial experience for the people. That is the message that the new Economic Survey has brought home. The economic incompetence of Pakistan's recent years under Shaukat Aziz is now being revealed.
But let us talk of the Long March and how powerful are the messages that they bring home. There is one that has been coming from Barrister Aitzaz Ahsan in which he has been contending forcefully that President Musharraf is standing at the exit door gate, and he is no more an issue when it comes to the restoration of the deposed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry and 60 other superior judges. And the way in which he recites poetry (which he has written) is inspiring and makes large crowds in the Long March respond with slogans of " Go Musharraf Go".
Which reminds me of the speeches that I have heard in the Long March coverage. Speeches of the Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, Munir Malik, Justice Tariq Mahmood, Ali Ahmad Kurd, Justice Rasheed Razvi (Retd), and others, all of whom reflect the intense desire there is for justice in this society, and the sustained courage of speaking out on all that obstructs the road to an independent and free judiciary.
Both the Long March, one of its kind in the history of this country, and the federal budget from which the people were hoping to get some relief have been two main themes during the week, against a backdrop that larger political changes are likely in the land.
In passing I must mention that it was good to see Dr Mubashir Hasan speak cynically about the federal budget 2008-09 on Aaj TV on Thursday afternoon, and not only reminded that Pakistan should not be compared to the United States, and that he saw no reason why Pakistan's elected representatives were paid so highly. For those who may have forgotten, he was our finance minister in the seventies, under Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and he is one of those who always speaks out for the common man - and has an empathy when he does so.
NEPAL KING LEAVES PALACE: I would like to believe that the fact that the deposed King of Nepal, the 60 year old Gyanendra has left the palace to live as a commoner, in "a complex of about a dozen tin roofed concrete houses and huts set on a jungle clad hillside just outside the city until he finds a more permanent home", is a story of high interest among Pakistanis.
A Reuters report on 11th June said that the deposed King, who seized absolute power in 2005 expressed "some regret" but made no formal apology. He left the pink pagoda-roofed palace for on Wednesday but vowed to stay in the country and work for its people. Some people chanted "Gyane, thief leave the country", cheering and dancing as he drove away. Thousands watched as he drove away.
With the end of the monarchy in Nepal, the world's newest republic is now supposed to face even more formidable challenges. It is said that the country's political parties have to agree on who should be Nepal's new President and Prime Minister, and then get down to the complex job of drawing up a new constitution" said Reuters.
AN AMERICAN MEDIA PERSON TALKS: With the kind of turbulent political scene that has been prevailing for the last fifteen months now in Pakistan, it is understandable that a programme like Diplomatic Enclave (News One), does not get as noticed as much as it could. In between various panel discussions, breaking news stories and interviews of major and mainstream political leaders and those of the lawyers movement I have seen this interesting, informative programme sometimes.
And I have wondered why it cannot be better than what it is. It is relevant to mention here that the focal person for the programme is Anjum Niaz, who is a senior journalist, writing for Dawn and The News regularly. She speaks earnestly, and makes the programme bilingual (English and Urdu), and I often wonder about this.
On Sunday last (8th June), I noticed that she was interviewing Dr Elizabeth Colton, the US Embassy (Islamabad) press attache and spokesperson, who came through as an unusual professional. She sounded as an extraordinary media person, having been an important working journalist, who joined the US Foreign Service (in her fifties). And being the dreamer that she sounded like she hopes to work as a special envoy promoting peace in a world tormented, traumatised and threatened by a growing fear of disorder and destruction.
Given loadshedding and the acceptable distractions that come from the political programmes, I saw this show in two parts. Once in the evening and then a larger part later after midnight (that's the impression I have). To hear a spokesperson of the American embassy in Islamabad, speak about her own life and times, was an engrossing experience.
That Dr Elizabeth Colton was once a journalist, and will always remain one (by instinct as she said) she stressed. She recalled that she has been visiting Pakistan for almost thirty years now --- and some of the work that she has done in this country includes the interview that she did of late Prime Minister Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and the late President General M Ziaul Haq. She met Benazir Bhutto in 1986 when she returned to Pakistan and covered the historic event.
Anjum Niaz complimented Dr Elizabeth Colton very generously, expressing her admiration of the professional life and work of the American journalists. She said that she had noticed that Dr Colton had a huge collection of newspapers in her home. The camera eye shifted to the newspapers, kept carefully and methodically in a room on shelves specially made for them. She said that she always began her day, (as a professional) by reading the newspapers wherever she is staying, and were she to miss out on this inspiring routine for some reason she feels uneasy and incomplete for the rest of the day.
Dr Colton listed the English daily newspapers that she has been keeping systematically since November 2006 when she came to Pakistan on this posting. These ten newspapers (as mentioned by her) are Dawn, Frontier Post, Statesman, Business Recorder, The News, Daily Times, Pakistan Observer, the Nation, and The Post.
She mentioned that she also kept the magazine sections of the newspapers, and added that she always read every page of the weekly Good Times. What is she going to do with all these newspapers? She is evidently leaving Pakistan at the end of her assignment in the near future.
She said that these newspapers were a treasure and had a historical value and that she had spoken to the National Library to which she would present them all. She said that this was probably the first posting where she had retained the dailies.
It was a fairly wide-ranging conversation that took place in the interview. One theme was why the United States has been posting women ambassadors to Pakistan since the least six or seven years, and Anjum Niaz smiled as she said this. Dr Colton felt that woman envoys were as good and that this was not a deliberate and conscious decision.- implying that with time more and more women were coming into the work force the world over.
Recalling that she had wanted to be a journalist at the age of eight, and that she had spent her initial years in the print media. Then she moved into the electronic media and also bagged the prestigious Emmy award. She has also been a professor journalism. And Dr Colton has also studied at the London School of Economics.
She said that she went to Maldives as a tourist, and ended up staying there for two years researching the political elite of that place. Of course there was talk of the retiring age in the American Foreign Service (65 years) and that there was no retiring age for university teachers and the US civil service.
Towards the end there was mention of Admiral Mullen and his visit to Pakistan, and the US press attache said that it was a matter of significance for Pakistan as well that he had come here thrice since February this year. She referred to the value that the United States attached to the ordinary people in Pakistan and their views. She agreed with Anjum Niaz that when there were misconceptions in the public mind these needed to be removed.
IFFAT OMAR ON DAWN NEWS: Iffat Omar, an attractive model, producer, director and anchor was attempting to sound modest when she said on Dawn News TV that she believed that she was mediocre looking, and that there were many more girls in the field now, who were far more attractive. She was appearing in a programme called "No Reservations". The anchor paid her the most generous compliments for her stunning looks at the very outset, and she responded by saying that this was a blessing from the Almighty Allah.
The other guest in the show was the well-known Tariq Amin (in a summer outfit, as he described it) and it was for TV viewers informative, as well as an update to hear them talk about the fashion scene in the country.