Adil Najam
News is that GEO Network is closing down. I hope the news is a false alarm, but I am told that this has been announced on Geo TV itself. An email making the rounds from someone at GEO itself reads:
At this moment we here at Geo are extremely SAD as Geo network is forced to shut down due to Govt pressure on UAE our base country.
Insha Allah we will fight. We are proud that the management of Jang Group never made compromise and prefer to fight till death.
I would rather wait to hear more details and to see reaction to this from the government, from the people of Pakistan and also the rest of the world before I comment in detail. But my first reaction is, yet again, one of disgust. The things that we coudl have been most proud of in recent years and months – an assertive judiciary, a free media – are being snatched away one by one. I hope it turns out not to be so. But if so, then who next?
Original Post (Nov. 4, 2007):
The emergency declared by Gen. Pervez Musharraf yesterday was not surprising. But that does not make it any less disturbing. Amongst the many unspeakable actions that have resulted from this is a clampdown on the media, especially the electronic news media. In response, GEO News has made the audio stream of its transmissions available on line.
You can listen to GEO News by clicking on image below.
Windows Media Player or VLC is required to play this live audio.
All commentators,
Media, journalists, newspapers must also be put
on public trial, we shall hear and see the truth,
rest is nothing but running commentary on the
lost Pakistani Cricket match. Are we not bad
loosers ??
Iam surprsied that Dubai government has ordered the news channel to shut down their broadcast on the pressure from Pakistan government
I am not surprised. Arab regimes always have supported dictatorship in Pakistan since they also like one- man-army in their respective states.
On a related note, I made a post based on picture published in Jang. The nomad seems much better in condition that 16 billion Pakistais.
Mad general is bound to destroy everything that comes his way. A mad dictator of a nuclear state is bound to blackmail the whole world if he sees that he is going to loose the battle.
He is now going to use his last card , read here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/pakistan/story/2007/11/0 71117_mush_interview_fz.shtml
The world has seen Hitler who tried his best to acquire the nuclear weapons and would must have used if he had them.
Now we have a far more dangerous dictator than Hitler ,
this is a clear and present danger, I hope that United States and other countries have contingency plan for this.
Ali Raza has made some valid points including the fact that media barons are interested in profits and ‘freedom of expression’ is yet another product to be sold on the shelf.
Having said that, freedom of expression is non negotiable and the forced shut down of these channels is UNACCEPTABLE.
I think that GEO is simply running out of hard cash to sustain their transmission operations in Dubai. Recent ‘gala ghotu’ tactic of the Pak government by getting GEO of the air in Pakistan and then not allowing them to air the cricket series between India-Pakistan has crippled GEO financially. I doubt if Pakistani Government would have had the final say in shutting down GEO in UAE. As I always say, when money talks, objectivity takes a hike. An important lesson in global economic warfare for GEO.