Access to information and the empowerment of people
Amanullah Khan
Article 39(2)(a) of Bangladesh Constitution guarantees the right of every citizen to freedom of speech and expression “subject to any reasonable restriction imposed by law with a view to safeguarding the security of the state, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, decency or morality and preventing contempt of court, defamation or incitement to an offence.
This right representing the mother of many other rights that flow from it is upheld by Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which proclaims “everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression that includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers.”
I will briefly touch on some aspects of the agenda and the emergency regime in Bangladesh in this context.
The theme set by UNESCO for this year’s World Press Freedom Day begins with freedom of expression that carries with it an onerous responsibility which we may tend to overlook in our over-zealous quest for self-expression. Responsibility requires that while we express our views and opinions, we must have regard for and respect the sensitivities, sentiments, culture and customs of others and be careful not to cause any offence to them in much the same way as we expect others to respect our feelings. Tolerance and restraint are essential components of freedom of expression which should not be abused, misused or treated as a licence.
Secondly, access to information doesn’t mean just any kind of information a large part of which may be redundant, superfluous, useless or even inaccurate, unreliable and biased or vitiated. It is only quality information that is vital in empowering people.
Furthermore, free flow of information may not suffice in itself, it must also be easily and readily accessible to the general public who should possess the means to put it to practical use and convert it into tangible and specific benefits and be able to apply to it their real-life situations in order to solve their problems and cater to their needs.
The question of who owns and controls the information is also of relevance. In cases of citizen journalism and community radio, both the tools and the media products are owned by those who operate them, i.e. the ordinary people at the grassroots.
A handful of media giants who own a major part of media outlets in the US and other parts of the West control the flow of information and set the agenda for the consumers. In most of the developing countries, the governments have a monopoly over and strictly regulate the media using them mainly as their propaganda tools.
All such manipulations over regulation and abuses deprive the people of empowerment that is made possible through dissemination, exchange and sharing of information without any impediment. Pluralistic and democratic media with public service contents help the process of empowerment of people. The community radio now being licensed by the present government in Bangladesh represents the most cost effective and influential broadcast media tool to give power and voice to the powerless and the voiceless.
In the existing scenario of emergency rule in Bangladesh, one may wonder that while the successive elected governments lacked the political will to replace a legacy of the British Empire, the Official Secrets Act, with the Right to Information Act for a protracted period of time, the present Caretaker government with its sweeping powers is able to formulate a draft Right to Information Act ready to be adopted.
The draft act being debated in public forums has been hailed as a landmark law that will lead to establishing an open, transparent and accountable government in Bangladesh notwithstanding a few drawbacks that have crept into it like long-winding and circuitous process involved in acquiring the information from any government department and the control/cap on getting information on defence-related matters.
The government ruling the country today has repeatedly described the media as the second parliament in the absence of a functioning Parliament. Though under the provisions of the Emergency Rules, some fundamental rights guaranteed in the country’s Constitution have been suspended with restriction imposed on publishing materials, considered sensitive and inflammatory, the government appears to welcome constructive criticism and suggestions to improve its workings short of delivering any damning condemnation of it which is quite understandable.
Barring a few exceptions like TV live talk shows airing opinions critical of the emergency rule, the government is generally perceived to be tolerant of non-conformist views. In fact, a cursory glance at any Bangladesh newspapers may convince a reader that the press here is as free, vocal and robust as ever, of course with certain ground rules in force following the clampdown of an emergency to quell the violence and bloodshed that had erupted and subsequently to purge politics and administration of endemic corruption.
This government is credited with introducing a number of fundamental reforms long overdue like separating the Judiciary from the Executive organ. framing proposals for reform of electoral laws and signing the UN Anti-Corruption Convention. The government is also committed to holding the general elections on schedule designed to restore the Parliamentary democracy in Bangladesh and the EC is doing a good job of it with a few setbacks that may not hopefully disrupt the ultimate countdown.
Every citizen of Bangladesh expects that the country will return to a democratic rule with full civil liberties including press freedom restored at the earliest possible time. On the occasion of the World Press Freedom Day, for our countrymen, there is hardly any desire more cherished that democracy, freedom of expression and speech that will ensure good governance and transparency, As for the media practitioners, while there may not be much to celebrate or rejoice about, it is a time for them to renew their commitment to continue the unrelenting struggle to win ever more and larger press freedoms in the face of curtailment or denial of such freedom by state and non-state actors who feel threatened by the free press.
(The article is based on an address given by the author at a seminar in Dhaka organised by Singapore-based AMIC and UNB in collaboration with UNESCO, PIB and ULAB to mark the World Press Freedom Day 2008. The author is the Chairman of UNB and AMIC Representative in Bangladesh).
