BY Harsha Man Maharjan
It was not supposed to end like this.
I had pinned hope on this. Hope that it would come up with ways of restructuring state media in Nepal.
Nepali government formed a task force to materialize suggestions of High Level Media suggestion Commission about state media in December 2006. It was supposed to present its report to government in two months.
And it has already handed its report to the government. There was no mention about this in media. The government has not made it public.
When I asked about the report, Dhurba Hari Adhikari, a member of the task force informed me that the task force handed its report in his absence. He requested me to call Ministry of Information and communications.. There telephones always remained busy. So I called Badri Bahadur Karki, task force’s chair. Karki informed me that he handed its report in Asar that means about three months ago. He even requested me to knock the door of ministry of information and communication.
Why this kind of silence ? Why is government not making it public ? Questions arise. Answer is simple. Recommendations of task is unfavorable to present government. Without studying the report, people can guess its recommendation. The task force has mandate to materialize recommendations of media commission and the commission had suggested to quit government’s involvement in all state media. But present government is unwilling to do so. It is still interested to meddle with these media.
Where are our rights to information? We have all rights to know recommendations of the task force.
Previous posting on the issue:
Future of High-level Taskforce on Restructuring and Autonomy of Government Media
http://mediaharsha.blogspot.com/2007/06/future-of-high-level-taskforce-on.html
Last Chance: Restructuring of State Media in Nepal
http://mediaharsha.blogspot.com/2007/03/last-chance-restructuring-of-state.html
link:
High Level Media suggestion Commission
http://www.fnjnepal.org/downloads/Media_Commission_report.doc
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