Nurul Haque Nur, leader of one faction of Gono Odhikar Parishad unleashed a wave of vitriol against leading media outlets and reprimanded journalists saying “some of their works made journalism akin to porn scripture”.
He said that in response to a barrage of critical media reports quoting leaders from Gono Odhikar Parishad, which has split into two, over embezzlement of party funds donated from the Bangladeshi diaspora.
In a separate Facebook post, Nur called out two media outlets namely Somoy TV and DBC News, and said: “Journalists are slaves of the government and a section of people made journalism a work of porn scripture.”
A day before the statement, he termed Somoy TV as a “rumour factory”.
Both outlets published stories on Nur's conversations with an unidentified person over supplying arms and funding for the banned outfit Kuki-Chin National Front, a militant organization allegedly responsible for killing officers of armed forces in the hill tracts, and statements of Nur's party colleagues who claimed the former made a botched out effort to lure them with hefty amounts worth Tk30 million and in exchange they have to stand for Nur.
Weeks back, the controversial leader resorted to Facebook and issued a public threat of taking action against a newspaper following a report that focused on the alleged misappropriation of money attributed to insiders from his party and incorporated his comments.
Six months back, Nur called out journalists as “slaves” in the face of reports of his meeting with an Israeli.
“You journalists are slaves and I ask you (journos) how much money did you get to report against me”, Nur was seen lashing out at the press in a Facebook video in the face of media reports that were critical to his overseas trips.
"It is really ironic that so-called leaders like Nur who often accuse the government of muzzling press freedom, now don't find self-contradictory to use Facebook as a platform to threaten the media. Nur's talk about press freedom and such wholesale assertion make their lecture on country's press freedom their intolerance towards adverse reporting that only seeks to hold them into account,” said senior journalist Gazi Nasiruddin Khokon, the former joint editor of Desh Rupantor.
He added: “While Nur received support from media earlier during his earlier movement, the demonstration of his aversion to adverse reportage clearly made his hue and cry for press freedom a complete mockery like shedding crocodile tears.”
