In Pakistan, arrest of popular journalist poses fresh threat to vibrant media landscape

The legal troubles of a prominent Pakistani journalist have raised concern about the state of press freedom in the country.

Asad Ali Toor, host of the popular YouTube series “Uncensored,” was granted bail on Saturday after spending three weeks in jail on charges of launching an “explicit and malicious” campaign against the superior judiciary. 

Mr. Toor had been fiercely critical of the judiciary in the run up to this year’s general election, accusing the country’s top judge, Qazi Faez Isa, of derailing democracy by stripping the major political party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf of its electoral symbol before the Feb. 8 vote. “The historian will write about [Chief Justice Isa] ... as the man who helped the military block the path of a political party,” he said in one of his vlogs.

Mr. Toor’s lawyers say he was kept in crowded, inhumane conditions and pressured to reveal his sources. He is now expected to lie low as lawyers petition for the charges to be dismissed. Regardless of the outcome, analysts say Mr. Toor’s ordeal is reflective of mounting pressures faced by independent media in Pakistan. 

The country’s media landscape is among the most vibrant in Asia, with more than 40 TV news channels and as many as 700 newspapers in print. Yet press freedom activists warn that the famously boisterous media has become a target of Pakistan’s military establishment, which holds enormous sway over law and politics. Some hoped recent elections would herald in change, but ongoing cases suggest that anti-journalist hostility is now the norm. 

“The newly formed government has done nothing to ameliorate the situation, but rather added to it by continuing this clampdown,” says journalist Taha Siddiqui, who has been living in exile since 2018. 

Pakistani journalists adapt

Pakistani media blossomed under the military dictatorship of Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who took control in a bloodless coup in October 1999. At the time, Pakistan Television, the state broadcaster, held a monopoly over broadcasting, but had so little credibility among the general public that viewers would turn to Indian television to get their news. Under General Musharraf’s rule, legislation was introduced to liberalize the media landscape and create space for private news channels to enter the market. In the two decades since, Pakistan has seen a proliferation of news outlets that have created a culture of muckraking and critical inquiry. Today, that culture is under threat.

K.M. Chaudary/AP/File

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, shown during a press conference in Lahore, Pakistan, last month, visited journalist Asad Ali Toor after he was attacked in 2021.

Media-watchers trace the current crackdown to the time of the “hybrid regime” – a power-sharing alliance between the government of Imran Khan and the top brass of the Pakistan army, which ended with Mr. Khan’s ouster in a 2022 vote of no-confidence. During the early days of the regime, journalists critical of the military and of Mr. Khan’s government were taken off air and blacklisted. 

“The mainstream media was brought to heel a while ago,” says veteran journalist Cyril Almeida. “It now essentially reports what the military allows it to.”

Many unemployed journalists migrated to YouTube, where Mr. Almeida says reporters have “yet to be tamed.” On social media, they were free to produce vlogs on sensitive issues and, depending on the platform’s monetization policy, made decent money doing it. 

One of the first to make the switch was Mr. Toor, a TV news producer who used his twice daily vlogs to report on areas that were considered no-go zones for the mainstream media. 

Mr. Toor built his audience of 160,000 by opposing military intervention in the political sphere, a position that he believes made him a target for the powers that be.

In May 2021, Mr. Toor was hospitalized after being attacked in his apartment by a group of men who allegedly identified themselves as belonging to Pakistan’s premier intelligence agency. At the time, many of the political parties opposed to Mr. Khan’s government condemned the attack as an example of state tyranny. Notably, he was visited by then-leader of the opposition, Shehbaz Sharif, and senior Pakistan Muslim League-N politician Maryam Nawaz. Today, Mr. Sharif is serving as prime minister and Ms. Nawaz as chief minister of Punjab, but the persecution of journalists has not abated.

Weak press protections

Pakistan ranks 150 out of 180 on the 2023 Global Press Freedom Index compiled by Reporters Without Borders, a modest uptick from 2022 but still lower than when Mr. Khan took office. The report states that “political parties in opposition support press freedom, but are first to restrict it when in power.”

At least 64 Pakistani journalists have been killed since 1992, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), and many more have faced physical or legal harassment. Indeed, legal protections are often vague and filled with caveats.

Pakistan’s Constitution, while promising freedom of the press, subjects this freedom to “any reasonable restrictions imposed in the interest of … the integrity, security or defence of Pakistan.” Critics say this provision allows the state to prosecute journalists who speak up against the excesses of state institutions, including the judiciary and military establishment.

Mr. Toor has been charged under three sections of the 2016 Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, a piece of legislation that free speech campaigners say is designed to stifle criticism of the country’s powerful army. His release comes just a couple weeks after a different journalist, Imran Riaz Khan, was freed on bail and then immediately rearrested on seperate terrorism charges. CPJ has condemned the treatment of both men.

“Authorities must cease using the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act and other draconian laws to persecute journalists and silence critical reporting and commentary,” said Beh Lih Yi, Asia program coordinator at CPJ, in a statement.

Analysts say that the victimization of journalists like Mr. Toor shows the press the consequences of stepping out of line.

Mr. Toor “did what we call speaking truth to power,” says digital rights campaigner Usama Khilji. “All institutions including the military, judiciary, and our political and civilian institutions, he would hold them accountable without discrimination. I think that seems to have gotten him on the wrong side of the powers that be.”