PEMRA Bill referred to Senate standing committee after opposition

ISLAMABAD: Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani on Friday referred the PEMRA [Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority] (Amendment) Bill, 2023 to the relevant standing committee of the upper house of Parliament after fierce opposition, ARY News reported.

Members of the opposition benches opposed the bill – which was tabled by Information Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb – and demanded that it should be sent to the relevant Senate standing committee.

Speaking on the Senate floor, the information minister said that the government had held consultations on the bill for 12 months. “Discussions on the definitions of information and disinformation took place for 11 months,” she added.

Marriyum Aurangzeb added that under the new amendments, fines over violation had been increased, adding that the definitions in the current law were “draconian” while the new bill gave room for errors.

“The amendments empowered PEMRA as it took away the right from the body’s chairman to shut down channels and gave them to the authority,” she added.

Amid the opposition, the minister said that in the last 15 months, freedom of expression has jumped up seven points up on the international level.

Subsequently, Senate Chairman Sanjarani referred the PEMRA Amendment Bill to the relevant standing committee.

The Bill

Earlier this week, the National Assembly approved PEMRA (Amendment) Bill, 2023, imposing a limit on duration of ‘advertising breaks’ during a regular programme and defining ‘misinformation’.

According to the bill, “disinformation means verifiably false, misleading, manipulated, created or fabricated information which is disseminated or shared with the intention to cause harm to the reputation of or to harass any person for political, personal, or financial interest or gains without making an effort to get other person’s point of view or not giving it proper coverage and space, but does not include misinformation”.

As for misinformation, the bill states that “misinformation means verifiable false content or information that is unintentionally disseminated or shared”.

An amendment in clause 2 proposes to ensure “fair, transparent and independent rating to the broadcasters for their TV channels.”

Through an amendment in Section 4, a new sub-section was added after sub-section (3) that proposes “the Authority by registering rating companies shall ensure that fair, transparent, and independent forums shall issue rating to the licensees’’.