A pro-democracy think-tank has recently stated, based on research, that press freedom, which had declined significantly in the past five years, is now at its lowest in the last 50 years. It appears, in the history of the past half century, suppressing or distorting the truth has become a norm of sorts.
While at London School of Journalism, back in the mid 90s, one teacher gave a perfect definition of journalism: A news or a fact that someone does not want published; everything else is just advertisement. If we think a little deeply, the significance of the line dawns on us.
Last year, during the student-led uprising in Bangladesh, media outlets, which were presenting the facts, were doing their job properly, earning widespread accolades from the general people. Meanwhile, those which zealously propagated the government’s narrative were dubbed the spin-doctors, swiftly losing credibility.
Anyway, we are in a strife-torn world where people gathering facts to present the real picture to others find that their work is increasingly becoming more perilous. The danger is doubled if the media body owner is keen to use journalism as a façade to please the quarter in power.
In Bangladesh too, the media faces a tough challenge in choosing between the task of presenting events as they are or sugar coating/papering over the cracks to serve some selfish interest. While press freedom is in jeopardy in several countries, post revolution Bangladesh is hoping the sector will see some much-needed reforms to make it more robust, transparent and neutral.
Pay wages and don’t interfere
“Actually, not too many reforms are needed, a very few basic ones can work wonders,” observed Abdullah Reza, a reporter for an English daily. The first issue is financial security plus the willingness of each and every media owning business house to comply with the government established wage board, he said.
Echoing the sentiment, a former journalist, Atiqur Rahman, said: “Most media houses have a cloak and dagger approach to matters related to wages. Unfortunately, some get as per the wage board while others are offered a pittance.” Discrimination sows resentment, leading to unethical practices, creating a premise for crony journalism to proliferate, he lamented.
“Many leading media houses circumvent the wage board obligation simply by offering contract-based employment, thus setting up and giving legality to an unjust practice.”
The late journalist Zakaria Siraji, known as “Zak bhai to both seniors and juniors once told me in the late 90s, when big business bodies were strategically injecting huge amounts of money into media houses, that the success of a media organization depended mainly on the least amount of interference from the owner.
If I recall his exact words: “When the editor is given full charge of a paper or a channel and allowed to follow integrity based journalism, a media house will become successful.” Sadly, the word “successful” media house is often misunderstood. Media bodies are never meant to churn millions.
They are here to serve society, the masses and, yes, in the real world, add to the prestige of the owning company.
As Syed Mehedi, a veteran journalist, observes: “Most business houses know this and before financing a media body, journalists make it clear that the purpose is not to make money but also not
too incur huge losses either but to make a self-sufficient media house that will earn the trust of the people.”
Unfortunately, after a few years, the owners, thinking strictly in terms of hard core profit, begin demanding financial returns, interfering injudiciously in the operation of the media houses, thus undermining their neutrality, he added,
In Bangladesh, several media houses, both in print and broadcast, enjoy both journalistic prestige and financial solvency simply because either the owners have decided not to interfere or because the owner is also a media savvy person and makes it a point to sit regularly at the media house to interact regularly with the journalists.
Journalism not pulling the young anymore
The one other peril facing journalism is the rise of apathy towards the profession from young graduates. In the decades after independence, students, mostly from upper middle class families, with property in Dhaka or elsewhere, chose the profession out of passion and because they did not feel any social pressure to pursue any other line of work.
Times have changed, children from families with similar socio-economic dynamics rarely stay in the country and prefer to go abroad, first for education and, then, to live and work. As a result, that educated section from an economically solid background is now missing from journalism. When the young graduate from university, they predominantly have either overseas higher education, government service or the corporate sector in mind.
They cannot be blamed.
Society is fuelled by a very materialism/security-driven creed where journalism does not make the list of top job preferences. In short, the challenges of the profession seem alluring from a distance but no one wants to accept them. About seven years ago, while speaking at a university job fair, I asked the students present how many would be willing to enter journalism to kick-start their career.
Not a single hand went up.
There was a roar in the room when a former student, who had successfully cracked the civil service exam, entered to give advice. The paradox is this: We want the media to be neutral, integrity-based, ethical and top notch but are reluctant to be part of it.
Journalism will thrive when it is chosen by the dynamic youth of today as a profession, when media house owners decide to stop exploiting a paper or a channel to cosy up to the party in power, and when political parties stop expecting media houses to blindly be their mouthpiece. It will thrive only when there is a transparent wage board implemented ensuring fair pay for all involved.
Towheed Feroze is a former journalist.