time was up for the media to come out of the clutches of the information ministry. Mushy was at the height of his power when he opened up the media flood gates. there was no pressure.
what I would agree is that there was no thought about code of conduct and it was same media that was used by his enemies against him, same media outplayed lal musjid operation, showed TTP and TNSM in Sawat as heroes etc and made some morbid Pakistan hating "intellectuals" and opinion makers as a house hold name
Gen Musharaf like ALL his predecessors decided that he needs to be popular and loved by people of Pakistan and for that he tried to become a democratic leader. but that didnt work as it never worked for all prior dictating generals and they had to bow out and step down (bar Gen Zia, he was violently removed)
professional politicians do the exact opposite they become dictators
coming back to subject matter,. recall Hillary announced 450m allocation in Pakistani media to get American point of view popular in Pakistan and that view had been only critical of Pakistani security forces and Pakistan's stand on Afghanistan and India.
My stance is simple:
Everyone between Jinnah and IK has been either questionable or outright treasonous.
I don't distinguish between politicians (buying votes) or military dictators (not delivering the kind of revolutionary reforms required) --- both have been horrendous.
Mush's problem was a lack of strategic vision. Maybe he was a great commando --- and would have made a great GOC SSG! But that's about it.
All the "hybrid war" issues we face today are the direct result of his shortsightedness. I say this as a huge supporter of our Armed Forces and agencies.
While Mushy should be taken to task for his need to appear all moderate and stuff, his opening of the media isn't the problem per se. What is the problem is that the amateurs at ghq/ispr have no clue about how to use the modern modes of media to their advantage. Media is just a tool, either use it to your advantage or have it be used against you. But the geniuses over at ghq/mofa have no clue as to how to engage and communicate properly. They're still stuck in 1960s level propaganda and they have huge egos that vitiate against any forward-looking reform or strategy in strategic communications. Until then we're stuck with the amateurs over at ISPR.
Having a social media cell is a necessity. But their venting should be against the establishment for letting them and the people of Pakistan down at every turn. See the release of a ptm propagandist.
Someone gets it. However the only volatility that ethnic party is capable of is on twitter. They're not the threat that people make them out to be in excusing lack of action against them.
While I agree that nobody in the government/Army knows how to manage the media effectively (without it looking like propaganda and thus losing all legitimacy/notions of impartiality), I don't think that's the only issue.
If we look at just MSM, it's apparent that the flag-bearers both in the US (Washington Post / NYT) and India (Times of India, NDTV, The Hindu, etc.) essentially parrot the views of the Deep State and further its agenda... whereas in Pakistan, it's the exact opposite. This, in my view, is the core problem. The media in both these "democracies" is simply in bed with the Deep State while still being hailed as progressive and impartial (WaPo and NYT especially.)
Of course social media is another ballgame altogether.
The lack of counter-narratives to PTM's poison is just the latest showcase of the failure of all govt media efforts across civil and military domains.
Done.
I point fingers only because we fail to learn from mistakes. We have to STRUCTURALLY get rid of this problem rather than as concerned civilian patriots.
Why are civ and military governments so scared of creating a China-style media environment, where the State-sponsored narrative is essentially the only one you get?
Instead, we expend huge resources trying to "grab our ears" the wrong way trying to deal with the fallout of our inability to make the hard decisions.
