The federal government has withdrawn the contentious Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Amendment) Bill, 2023, Information Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb announced on Monday.
The bill, which was passed by the National Assembly on August 3, had been the subject of intense debate among journalists, rights defenders, and opposition party members.
The proposed bill has been retracted following heavy criticism and wide-ranging concerns from the stakeholders concerned. Journalists and activists had raised objections about not being included in the drafting of the legislation and raised alarm over the rushed drafting and approval process.
The government, on the other hand, had claimed the legislation was drafted following “detailed consultations of eleven months” and in light of the “best international practices”. At the time of the bill’s approval by NA’s Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting, Aurangzeb termed it a “historic initiative for the welfare of journalists”.
The primary provisions of the bill that attracted widespread scrutiny included the definitions of misinformation and disinformation which, the government said, would provide legal remedies to challenge false, misleading, manipulated, created or fabricated misinformation.
Under the bill “disinformation means verifiably false, misleading, manipulated, created or fabricated information which is disseminated or shared with the intention to cause harm to the reputation of or to harass any person for political, personal, or financial interest or gains without making an effort to get other person’s point of view or not giving it proper coverage and space, but does not include misinformation”.
The legislation incorporated a “complete mechanism” to differentiate between misinformation and disinformation, the minister had claimed, adding that similar laws were examined from the European Union (EU), United Kingdom, Malaysia, and India.
Besides journalists and activists, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) had strongly rejected the proposed legislation. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) had also termed it a violation of Article 19 of the Constitution.
Moreover, the bill was supposed to empower a three-member committee to shut down a TV channel instead of the PEMRA chairperson alone. The legislation was necessitated by diversification in the Pakistani media comprising 40 channels covering news, current affairs, agriculture, entertainment, health, and education, according to the minister.
