Sharmila Farooqui for restoring media workers’ jobs

KARACHI: Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Women Wing leader and MPA Sharmila Farooqui on Sunday demanded of the federal government to ensure immediate restoration of pre-PM Imran status of media and help restore media workers who have lost their jobs in the present government era.

PTI government had brought the worst economic crisis in the country and destroyed the media industry by reducing advertisement rates to an alarming level that have left thousands of media workers and journalists jobless, she said in a statement. It was media that highlighted Imran during container politics but he in return stabbed it in the back, she said. Sharmila said PPP government had always been supporting media industry and ensuring freedom of expression but Khan’s government in a bid to silence some bitter truths had brought miseries to the media.

A vibrant and free media is a must for thriving democracy and development and the PPP government has always rejected draconian laws against media and is fully committed to supporting media and its workers, she said.

Sharmila said, “Forced retrenchment of independent journalists on the behest of anti-social elements, the arrest of Mir Shakil-ur-Rehman and curtailment of advertisements to dangerous level is part of PTI media curbs which will tarnish the democratic image of the country nationally and internationally.