Media bodies endorse PFUJ demands

ISLAMABAD: All the stakeholders of media industry have agreed to constitute a joint action committee of journalists, editors, broadcasters and owners to save the press and its working force from the increasing onslaught on their professional and economic rights.

On the invitation of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ), spearheading the movement for freedom of press and economic rights of media workers, All Pakistan Newspapers Society (APNS), Pakistan Broadcasters Association (PBA) and Council of Pakistan Newspapers Editors (CPNE) have agreed to launch a joint struggle for their rights in future. A joint meeting of all the four stakeholders will be held after today’s (Tuesday) protest to chalk out a joint strategy for the protection of their economic and democratic rights, says a press release.

The PFUJ has called upon its affiliated unions to muster the support of other democratic and human rights organisations, struggling for the rule of law, people’s democratic and economic rights in the country to make today’s (Tuesday) protest a complete success.

Other bodies, protecting the institution of editor and free flow of information, have also endorsed the PFUJ’s demands seeking permanent end to the un-announced censorship, retrenchment of workers and use of advertisements as a political tool against newspapers and private television channels.

The PFUJ President Afzal Butt has said his organisation will contact the Supreme Court Bar Association, Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and other democratic forums to seek their moral and practical support for the just cause of journalists.

He said that freedom of press and expression of opinion were two main pillars of democracy, but certain quarters were trying to make Pakistan a suffocated society. He said the PFUJ’s protest was aimed at making Pakistan a transparent and democratic society, wherein rights of its citizens, enshrined in the Constitution, must be protected.