Friday 27 January 2012
Tuesday 3 January 2012
Enterprise Journalism 2
Technically, the term ‘district reporter’ is used for a correspondent not based in the city where the national media’s production facilities are. But in practice, the journalists working anywhere other than Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad, are treated below par in terms of salaries, facilities, and capacity building. Reporters and sub-editors in Peshawer and Quetta – the provincial capitals that are also production hubs for a number of national news media outlets – are working for mainstream titles on monthly salaries of as little as six thousand rupees. Some drivers and domestic helpers in these two cities draw higher salaries. (The new Urdu daily, Nayee Baat has broken the tradition by hiring their staff in Peshawer at double or more the salaries they were drawing). Majority of correspondents in Gilgit are neither paid nor provided with equipment. They are expected to beg, borrow or steal, but file the text or footage in time anyways. They are only slightly more respectable than the district reporter, but they won’t let this distinction go unnoticed in their treatment of the small town colleague. The district reporters, realising their status as the lowest of the low, create their own power centres called Press Clubs.
Since the whole enterprise of district journalism is personality driven, it is inevitable that personalities clash and more press clubs come into being. In KPK Khyber Union of Journalists only represents Peshawer-based professionals while surrounding towns have their own press clubs. The Charsadda club has been padlocked after rival groups clashed over its control. It has been replaced by three different unions, all representing district correspondents in the vicinity. In Punjab, Jhelum has three press clubs, each claiming to represent the city journalists; Faisalabad saw a prolonged tug of war before press club elections could be held. And in Chakwal a group that had the backing of Ayaz Amir, threw out the management and took over the press club. The office bearers had to move court to retake control (more on why Ayaz Amir, the most famous son and politician of Chakwal and a senior journalist, had to fight with the lowly district reporters, in the next post).
As with any other racket, there are tiers to this enterprise as well. There’s the old school scribe who still wishes to change the world with his writing, raises funds for charitable causes and helps a few people with his clout. He could be a farmer, a shopkeeper or an office clerk, and practises journalism as passion or as an altruistic hobby. He may not excel in the craft but his intentions are good and they show up in his preachy articles published in the magazine section. For that matter the most famous rape story of Pakistan was broken by an unpaid district reporter (for daily Khabrain). Some of them make it to a big city and actually become ‘proper’ journalists.
The other district reporter is well off, has big ambitions, is on first-name terms with every rascal in town, greases every palm the government functionaries extend and squeezes every benefit he can from them, and more importantly, owns the distribution agency of the paper he works for. This last mentioned bit gives him enormous power over both his local rivals and the principles in the metro. He could sell all copies of the day, then have a picture taken of a group burning some newspapers on the street, and send the picture for publication and information that all copies went up in smoke. If he wants to show the paper is popular, he’ll start buying copies or forcing them on friends. If he doesn’t like something in the day’s paper, he’ll hold off distribution, and send the entire shipment back saying there are no buyers. He turns his employer into a business partner and matches them in crookedness, deed for deed.
At the end of the day though, the district reporter – even if he is a news agent and president of the press club as well – is no match for the employer. All his corruption is mere pennies when compared with that of his employer, who devised the whole system in the first place. The government, the NGOs, and the civil society have all learned to deal with the district reporter on his terms. No one has a problem with it.
The media houses should. They are fast losing credibility, and that would include newspapers too. In a round-up of the polls run on the Express Tribune website, one of the clearest verdicts was given on news media’s own trustworthiness. To the question: Do you believe the media in Pakistan is working in an ethical and professional manner? A whopping 91 per cent answered in negative.
The district reporter has very little to contribute to this trust deficit, but it’s him who could plug it most effectively with his community-based or ‘for people’ reporting – something never asked of him, and something he never learned to do.
Since the whole enterprise of district journalism is personality driven, it is inevitable that personalities clash and more press clubs come into being. In KPK Khyber Union of Journalists only represents Peshawer-based professionals while surrounding towns have their own press clubs. The Charsadda club has been padlocked after rival groups clashed over its control. It has been replaced by three different unions, all representing district correspondents in the vicinity. In Punjab, Jhelum has three press clubs, each claiming to represent the city journalists; Faisalabad saw a prolonged tug of war before press club elections could be held. And in Chakwal a group that had the backing of Ayaz Amir, threw out the management and took over the press club. The office bearers had to move court to retake control (more on why Ayaz Amir, the most famous son and politician of Chakwal and a senior journalist, had to fight with the lowly district reporters, in the next post).
As with any other racket, there are tiers to this enterprise as well. There’s the old school scribe who still wishes to change the world with his writing, raises funds for charitable causes and helps a few people with his clout. He could be a farmer, a shopkeeper or an office clerk, and practises journalism as passion or as an altruistic hobby. He may not excel in the craft but his intentions are good and they show up in his preachy articles published in the magazine section. For that matter the most famous rape story of Pakistan was broken by an unpaid district reporter (for daily Khabrain). Some of them make it to a big city and actually become ‘proper’ journalists.
The other district reporter is well off, has big ambitions, is on first-name terms with every rascal in town, greases every palm the government functionaries extend and squeezes every benefit he can from them, and more importantly, owns the distribution agency of the paper he works for. This last mentioned bit gives him enormous power over both his local rivals and the principles in the metro. He could sell all copies of the day, then have a picture taken of a group burning some newspapers on the street, and send the picture for publication and information that all copies went up in smoke. If he wants to show the paper is popular, he’ll start buying copies or forcing them on friends. If he doesn’t like something in the day’s paper, he’ll hold off distribution, and send the entire shipment back saying there are no buyers. He turns his employer into a business partner and matches them in crookedness, deed for deed.
At the end of the day though, the district reporter – even if he is a news agent and president of the press club as well – is no match for the employer. All his corruption is mere pennies when compared with that of his employer, who devised the whole system in the first place. The government, the NGOs, and the civil society have all learned to deal with the district reporter on his terms. No one has a problem with it.
The media houses should. They are fast losing credibility, and that would include newspapers too. In a round-up of the polls run on the Express Tribune website, one of the clearest verdicts was given on news media’s own trustworthiness. To the question: Do you believe the media in Pakistan is working in an ethical and professional manner? A whopping 91 per cent answered in negative.
The district reporter has very little to contribute to this trust deficit, but it’s him who could plug it most effectively with his community-based or ‘for people’ reporting – something never asked of him, and something he never learned to do.
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