Minister rejects report on PTV faux pas during PM’s speech
By Amir Wasim
ISLAMABAD, July 21: Minister for Information Sherry Rehman has rejected the findings of a committee formed by the PTV chairman to investigate the mismanagement which caused interruption during prime minister’s maiden address to the nation on July 19 and ordered a fresh inquiry.
“The minister has taken strict notice of the irregularities and ordered a probe into technical malfunctions and personnel incompetence responsible for a gross and unprofessional handling of this important assignment,” said a statement issued by her office.
On Monday, PTV chairman Dr Shahid Masood suspended deputy managing director Shahid Mahmood Nadeem and controller information technology Fakhar Hameed and issued a warning to director news and current affairs Sarwar Munir Rao on the basis of the initial inquiry.
According to a notification, general manager PTV News Ishtiaq Hussain was also held responsible and asked to submit a written explanation.
The ministry claimed in its statement that it had sent electronic as well as hard-copy versions of the speech of Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to the PTV officials concerned several hours in advance.
It said that when the minister had visited the PTV centre at 4pm to see the arrangements, the PTV chairman was ‘resting’ because of reported stomach problems. The minister noticed that PTV had not arranged the national flag and Quaid-i-Azam’s portrait.
The minister immediately arranged the necessary props from the Prime Minister’s House and get them placed in the studios before leaving for the PM House, the statement added.
The four-page inquiry report, a copy of which is available with Dawn, has put the entire blame on the PM’s media team for all the irregularities and mismanagement. However, there was no mention in the report about the fault of the deputy managing director for which he had been suspended, despite the fact that the PTV chairman himself was present in the office.
The inquiry team included Sarwar Munir Rao (director news and current affairs), Mujahid Bin Syed Gilani (director engineering), Asad Ahmad Jaspal (director administration and personnel) and Fakhar Hameed (IT controller).
Interestingly, the PTV chairman has suspended one member of the committee and issued a warning to another.
Sources told Dawn that differences between Ms Rehman and Dr Masood arose soon after PPP co-chairman Asif Zardari appointed Dr Masood as PTV chairman without consulting her.
Sources close to Ms Rehman said the PTV chairman was present in his office and pretended to have been suffering from stomach problems only to avid receiving the minister.
They said the PM’s media team had arrived at the PTV centre at 9pm with hard and soft copies of the speech, adding that the soft copy was in ‘Inpage’, an Urdu software which was not compatible with the teleprompter, and PTV officials had not given any prior information to the PM’s media staff about it. They said the entire speech had to be retyped in the compatible programme. As there were more than 40 pages, these were given to several typists that caused further problems for the PM’s media team.
The sources said that when the speech was being loaded onto the teleprompter, Director News and Current Affairs Sarwar Munir Rao was missing from the scene and the pages were not loaded in the correct order.
When the prime minister began the speech he was comfortable with the teleprompter. But when wrong pages started appearing, a PM House staffer immediately intervened and stopped the premier from reading the speech.
Luckily, the sources said, Sherry Rehman, Chaudhry Manzoor and Federal Minister for IT Qamar Zaman Kaira had brought a hard copy of the speech with them which was immediately handed over to the PM.
Interestingly, when the fault occurred in the teleprompter, both Dr Masood and Mr Rao disappeared and did not return till the prime minister resumed his speech from the hard copy, they added.
The sources said the minister was not happy over the ‘biased probe report and hasty dismissals’ because members of the inquiry team themselves were responsible for the mishandling. “It is ironic that the people responsible for this mishap were made members of the inquiry committee. It is also surprising that the chairman who is claimant of a master broadcaster, knowing very well that there might be a problem with the teleprompter, did not advise the PM not to use this gadget and that too in direct telecast of the address,” the sources said.
They said the initial inquiry report was presented to the PTV chairman at 2am on Monday, whereas private TV channels had ran the reports of the suspension of the officials at 1.30am.
They said the minister had taken notice that even before the conclusion of the inquiry ordered by her, the PTV chairman dismissed the deputy MD holding him responsible for the mishandling. They said that under the law, the PTV chairman could not suspend the deputy MD and he was supposed to present the inquiry report to the information minister for any action.
It was claimed in the inquiry report that information secretary Akram Shaheedi had been informed much earlier that “delivering a national address by the help of teleprompter is not advisable”. It said that a teleprompter camera had also been sent to the PM House at 7pm for rehearsal.
Dr Shahid Masood told Dawn that he had suspended the PTV officials in accordance with the services rules.
Minister rejects report on PTV faux pas during PM’s speech -DAWN - National; July 22, 2008