KARACHI, Pakistan — The recent terrorist attack on one of the terminals in Karachi’s international airport highlighted a number of issues — the militants’ strength, intelligence failures among Pakistan’s agencies, security lapses and the weak response of the government’s machinery in the face of an emergency.
It also illustrated the irresponsibility of TV media.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, which has been holding peace talks with the Pakistan government since May 2012, claimed responsibility for Sunday’s brazen late-night attack on the old terminal that is used mostly for cargo. The attack continued for over five hours, and 30 people, including 10 of the attackers, were killed.
Shortly after Sunday’s attack, TTP spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said, “This was just an example of what we are capable of and there is more to come. The government should be ready for even worse attacks.”
He also called the peace talks a sham and said that the attack was launched in retaliation for the death of TTP leader Hakimullah Mehsud, who died in a 2013 U.S. drone attack.
The following day, the militants attempted another attack close to the Airport Security Force training camp, but they fled soon after a heavy contingent of forces arrived at the scene.
Media ethics go out the window
Sunday’s attack kicked off a number of debates, such as whether the peace talks should continue and why the defense budget is increased when those who are supposed to protect the country and its people are so ill prepared. But within the journalistic community, coverage of the attack has prompted serious introspection.
The journalistic code of ethics was the first casualty in the media battle to be the first to break the news — even when there was no verified information to break.
“[F]or the larger part of the nation, sitting glued to their TVs in lounges, it seemed like a bomb was going off every ten minutes because that was the kind of picture being painted,” wrote Talha Ahmed of Dawn.com.
With plumes of smoke billowing from the airport as their backdrop, reporters had a field day sensationalizing and speculating over the situation. One reporter stated that a plane had been hijacked, while another insisted that a plane had caught fire.
Azhar Abbas, former head of Dawn and Geo News and current president and CEO of BOL News, told his 21,400 Twitter followers: “From the fire one can see, it seems a plane or a big vehicle has been set on fire close to the runway.”
Meanwhile, Syed Talat Hussain, a popular anchor and political analyst for Saach TV, called out the irresponsible practices as they were happening. He tweeted: “Channels showing name-tags,dead bodies of martyred personnel.Very bad.Very sad.”
“Corpses were shown, which is against the agreed norms, even if they were of the terrorists,” said Afia Salam, a media trainer and journalist who found the reporting to be speculative, as unverified information was put out to support the visuals.
Salam also pointed out that it was being reported that “the dead terrorists seemed to be of Uzbek and Chechen origin,” then this was “followed by statements that this will be confirmed once the DNA tests were carried out.”
No holds barred
The news channels kept panning their cameras toward the movement of the security forces, either forgetting or not concerned that they were covering an ongoing operation and this vital information could be relayed to the attackers by anyone watching the broadcast.
“Live coverage of inside airport should stop, hindering operation. Giving away position of assets/troops. Rather helping terrorists,” General Asim Bajwa, director general of the Inter-Services Public Relations, tweeted on Monday.
Speaking on the floor of the National Assembly on Wednesday, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, minister of the interior, called for a code of conduct for live coverage by news outlets. “It is essential to verify reports before they are broadcast during live coverage,” he said.
On Tuesday, even Abbas, the CEO of BOL News who had spread unverified information during the attack, tweeted: “We made a code four years back how to cover terrorism and related incidents. Where is that code. This type of coverage is ridiculous.”
According to Salam, editors and top members of the media got together to form a code for conflict reporting back in 2009. “Sadly, these norms didn’t last, because they were probably never internalized,” she told MintPress News.
“Ten years into the life of the independent broadcast sector and this is what they have to show in lieu of journalistic prowess? This [live coverage] was not only amateur, it was borderline criminal!” said Adnan Rehmat, a media analyst who expressed frustration with the situation, saying the coverage was “devoid of basics related to verification of information and therefore liable for institutional censure.”
“What is the need after a terror attack or a calamity for the race to claim how many casualties there have been? How can authentic statistics be available when events are continuing to unfold and relevant authorities haven’t yet verified accurate numbers?”
Talking to MintPress over the phone from Islamabad, Rehmat said the coverage only added to the fear and confusion taking hold among people calling into the TV stations and actively using social media to make sense of the unverified information.
“Unverified information in the backdrop of a public terrorism event is as dangerous as the terrorist attack itself,” he argued. “This is typical of such events that have occurred in the past in Pakistan — journalists take their cameras anywhere they want to, even in a crossfire or inside operation theaters at hospitals, they say anything they want to, based on conjecture and passing off opinion as fact rather than waiting for the officials to give proper facts and then relay it to the viewers.”
He also noted that there were “more than enough codes lying around,” yet without enforcement mechanisms and designated monitoring officials, the media organizations and reporters have no incentive to stick to the rules.
“Without detailed enforcement mechanisms, codes are merely a list of voluntary dos and don’ts,” Rehmat said, adding that in international media organizations, there are designated in-house organs to ensure compliance. Violations, then, incur censure and penalties.
Salam said she believes that those managing the reporters on the ground are responsible for the “bad journalism” exhibited on Sunday.
Rapping on media’s knuckles
“If they haven’t learnt now — and God knows Pakistani media has had a fair chance to learn how to cover these events — then it is time the regulator gave a slap on their wrist,” Salam said, referring to the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority.
Having trained reporters, Salam is now beginning to question whether such training was targeting the appropriate people. “Maybe a conversation needs to be initiated with the gatekeepers instead of the reporters in the field because the latter will do the bidding of those who are giving them directions from long distance.”
In response to this idea, Rehmat said, “Training itself achieves little, unless complemented by a declared policy enforced by the news director to regulate those working under him/her.”
He suggested that as a first step to minimize damage due to irresponsible coverage, live coverage of terror attacks and the government’s response to them should be firmly regulated by strong restrictions that aim to minimize the chances for spreading misinformation and prevent panic. He then added that from a press freedom perspective, this would be a rather “harsh measure.”
“If media refuses to play by self-applied professional rules then someone has to step in to do so. At a minimum, the airing of visuals should be restricted for the first one hour after a terror event. This will reduce ethical and professional violations by the media drastically,” Rehmat suggested.