The All Pakistan Newspapers Society (APNS) the association of all the newspaper and publication owners in the country – is the most powerful organisation after the government
Although it keeps losing cases in almost every court even up to the level of the Supreme Court of Pakistan - irrespective of the rulings, even of that of the apex court against them, the APNS stands defiant. It refuses acknowledge those decisions, with utter disdain. As if they are not legally oblighed to do anything at all.
A number of people have contested cases of being fired illegally, the newspaper owners have prolonged such cases to the point that it has reached the Supreme Court of Pakistan. The poor people who win suchcases, even then do not get their jobs back, in fact the APNS gangs up against working journalists in particular – ensuring that they can never find a job in any publication, none of their reports and articles are ever published. thus their careers are permanentlty destroyed. The APNS is living breathing cartel which can do exactly as it pleases and defies the law as and when it wishes.
If any company or any other organisation has committed fraud or some other crime, the matter is found out by a reporter, that news item will never published, This cartel uses such information to commit blackmail, because a lot more money can be made through blackmailing than letting the news item get published. This cartel is dangerous because they maintains dossiers on virtually everyone who seemingly has the slightest bit of influence. These influential people can be blackmailed at any time and be extorted to do anything the newspaper owners want them to do.
The enforcement of laws against the newspaper owners is extremely limited if not absolutely impossible. The courts can only make rulings against the APNS but apparently are at the moment absolutely unable to make the APNS actually obey orders. The APNS has lost the six-year-old case of the Wage Award,– but refuses to implement it because – it knows it can get away with it, in a sense these people are for all practical purposes completely above the law.
Several years ago, The Jang Group was charged with massive tax fraud and the government wanted them to pay up. The Jang Group got out of it, when it sought the help of all working journalists, by making all kinds of promises to them. The journalists at that time supported the Jang Group and held a huge demonstration to favour the Jang Group out of a misguided the perception that the government was victimising a publication. After the government backed out – the Jang Group broke all its promises it had made to the journalists. The massive tax fraud case is pending, the government is apparently not interested in pursuing the matter, although it can if it really wanted to. Presently it is not a priority matter. The APNS is so wealthy it can bribe practically anyone - things such as tax evasion or any other criminal activity they may be involved in is conveniently ignored.
Several newspapers survive without a single advertisement in their pages, the reason clearly is that they arerelying entirely on extortion and blackmail to survive. Some members of the APNS apart from massive tax evasion, are reportedly selling newsprint illegally, some are in one way or another linked to the illegal drugs trade – using the press as a means to prevent the authorities from investigating their myriad criminal activities. The moral of the story if anyone wants to avoid going to jail, should own a newspaper.
The enforcement of laws against the newspaper owners is extremely limited if not absolutely impossible. The courts can only make rulings against the APNS but apparently are at the moment absolutely unable to make the APNS actually obey orders. The APNS has lost the six-year-old case of the Wage Award,– but refuses to implement it because – it knows it can get away with it, in a sense these people are for all practical purposes completely above the law.
Several years ago, The Jang Group was charged with massive tax fraud and the government wanted them to pay up. The Jang Group got out of it, when it sought the help of all working journalists, by making all kinds of promises to them. The journalists at that time supported the Jang Group and held a huge demonstration to favour the Jang Group out of a misguided the perception that the government was victimising a publication. After the government backed out – the Jang Group broke all its promises it had made to the journalists. The massive tax fraud case is pending, the government is apparently not interested in pursuing the matter, although it can if it really wanted to. Presently it is not a priority matter. The APNS is so wealthy it can bribe practically anyone - things such as tax evasion or any other criminal activity they may be involved in is conveniently ignored.
Several newspapers survive without a single advertisement in their pages, the reason clearly is that they arerelying entirely on extortion and blackmail to survive. Some members of the APNS apart from massive tax evasion, are reportedly selling newsprint illegally, some are in one way or another linked to the illegal drugs trade – using the press as a means to prevent the authorities from investigating their myriad criminal activities. The moral of the story if anyone wants to avoid going to jail, should own a newspaper.
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