Corporate muscle is a major criminal here, Bangladeshi editor tells UNESCO seminar on Press Freedom Day

A Bangladesh editor sees ‘muscle powers’ of the advertisers and opportunistic ‘self-censorship’ by owners as big challenges in doing journalism with freedom, with the state finding it increasingly difficult to control the multidimensionally changing media.

Toufique Imrose Khalidi, who edits Bangladesh’s premier news publisher, says censorship or attack on press freedom does not always come from the government or from the state institutions.

“Corporate world is a major criminal here… a lot is done by big businesses or big spenders in advertising… corporate muscle tries to compete with our media muscle. More often than not, we lose in this battle,” he said at a UNESCO seminar in Dhaka on Tuesday.

The bdnews24.com editor-in-chief chaired the seminar held to mark World Press Freedom Day.

In Khalidi’s view, having freedom and being able to exercise that freedom are two different things.

The trouble begins with the (media) owners’ pedigree as businessmen who have very little or no sense of public service obligation, which creates crisis.

UNESCO organised the programme in over 100 countries. The main event was held in Finland with the theme, freedom of information. 

Chief Information Commissioner Golam Rahman and leading human rights activist and Transparency International Bangladesh Chairperson Sultana Kamal were among the discussants at the Dhaka programme.

Mass-line Media Centre (MMC) and ICS co-organised the seminar titled, ‘The State of Press Freedom in Bangladesh: Challenges and Way Forward’ at the CIRDAP auditorium.

Khalidi, the editor-in-chief of Bangladesh's first internet newspaper, said the ‘bigger’ challenge lies within the blurring line between professional journalism and circulation of information by almost anyone in this era of smartphones.

“Almost everyone is an information gatherer and provider. Almost everyone can disseminate news, information and at times, misinformation,” he said.

“The lines between the mainstream media run by trained professionals and social media dominated by the masses are getting increasingly blurred. Is it good for the society? The answer is both YES and NO.

“It’s YES, because so many are taking active interest in the affairs of the society and of the state, and making their views known, in other words, exercising their freedom of expression.

“The answer is NO, when limits are crossed,” Khalidi said.

“True, there are no clear lines drawn, but when right-wing radicals are trying to provoke people into violent response to a situation… we need to start serious discussions about a system of governance,” he added.

The bdnews24.com editor-in-chief referred to an incident in the UK, in which a Facebook invite for people to a get-together in front of a fast food shop resulted in a four-year prison term for two young men.

“When the extreme right tries to create an extreme situation, the law has to stretch its own hands to certain forms of media and certain kinds of ‘media’ activity,” Khalidi observed.

‘Sadly’, he said, the state only interferes when the government of the day perceives its own interests have been directly hit.

“The state doesn’t act when there’s an attack on the very fabric of a society, on the values that have for ages helped a society sustain itself in a peaceful environment,” he said.

“I have not seen punishment meted out to a cleric inciting extreme hatred against people of another faith who happen to be fewer in number in this particular country. There are quite a few on YouTube being watched by thousands of otherwise-innocent young people.

“This process of radicalisation is very much on,” Khalidi said.

“...when lunatics exercise their kind of freedom, the freedom we want to promote gets curtailed.

“We fear being targeted, assaulted, persecuted, prosecuted and even killed. Some of us do get killed,” he said.

Khalidi observed that a Facebook post attacking the prime minister is taken more seriously in Bangladesh than those clerics inciting religious or communal hatred.

“If you ask the information minister about management of media on behalf of the state, he will probably give you a blank look. He thinks his main task is to attack the political opposition and get headlines that would secure his job,” he said.

Since the beginning of media liberalisation in Bangladesh, the government has only tried to secure its own interest, he said. “The problem is it has tried to do it with a short-term perspective.  Longer term, I don’t think your interests can be protected in that manner.”

“The television stations that Khaleda Zia gave birth to in 2001-06 did not save her from being dragged out of her cantonment home and then through the corridors of the courts in Old Dhaka in 2007,” Khalidi added.

“The owners and managers all changed their tune because they had to save themselves first. They had their own skeletons in their cupboards.”

The bdnews24.com editor-in-chief was critical of “certain elements within the government or the state who espouse the idea of slapping restrictions on media about anything that could tarnish the image of law-enforcement agencies and the armed forces”.

“Are they not part of the state? Is prime minister bigger than the state? Are armed forces bigger than the state?” he asked.

He gave an example. “Recently, an incident happened inside a navy compound in Chittagong. We were told to take the story down. The argument: all other outlets did, why wouldn’t you?”

“My point was: I wouldn’t, because that was an incident that had occurred and, unless proven otherwise, I would not take it down,” Khalidi said.

The armed forces are tarnishing their own image by doing this, according to him.

He also asked if the image of one Nobel laureate is more important than the state and the society.

“One fellow editor once tried to lecture us that Muhammad Yunus is so big that we should be very careful about writing anything against him.

“Careful to the point that we would not even read the inspection reports of the regulators.

“If you went through the Bangladesh Bank reports on Grameen Bank, you would know the kind of management mess this institution had been, years before anyone in the government started pointing fingers.

“So why blame the government alone?” he asked.

“The government is asking us not to write against the government and an editor is asking us not to write anything against someone with whom he had plotted to launch a political party,” he said, “So there are problems within the media.”

Khalidi also said it is down to the way the government or the state manages the media, with the way politicians “seek to control the media through their loyal, friendly owners”.

“If the politicians want all major media outlets be owned, managed by businesses with questionable records, then there’s not much the media can do. There are those owners who have political ambitions, are seeking party tickets for parliamentary seats. They have problems with their tax files…” 

“In such a scenario, the freedom is not always curtailed by the powers-that-be on a daily basis; self-censorship is a serious issue here,” Khalidi said.

“Freedom of the press belongs to the people. We must defend it against assault from anyone – public or private!” he added.