(CEHURDES/IFEX) – The following is a CEHURDES statement: CEHURDES condemns government’s act of harassing F.M. radio stations Kathmandu, Nov. 7 – The Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Studies (CEHURDES), a Kathmandu-based press freedom monitoring group, condemns the government’s latest act of harassing impendent F.M. radio stations in the country. On Sunday (Nov. 6), officials […]
(CEHURDES/IFEX) – The following is a CEHURDES statement:
CEHURDES condemns government’s act of harassing F.M. radio stations
Kathmandu, Nov. 7 – The Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Studies (CEHURDES), a Kathmandu-based press freedom monitoring group, condemns the government’s latest act of harassing impendent F.M. radio stations in the country.
On Sunday (Nov. 6), officials at the Ministry of Information and Communications (MoIC) called various F.M. radio stations in the capital valley and summoned them to the Ministry. Some of the stations obliged while a number of others did not. Those who visited the Ministry were asked to sign a paper saying that they were not airing news, as directed by the government.
The new media ordinance, introduced by the government last month, prohibits F.M. radio stations from broadcasting news and news-based programmes and to criticize the king and royal family members, among others. The law includes provisions for jailing reporters for up to two years in defamation cases.
The government’s summons to F.M. radio stations has come at a time when the Supreme Court continues to hear petitions challenging the legal status of the ordinance itself.
CEHURDES condemns the latest act by the authorities to defy the court proceedings and intimidate and harass independent radio stations. We believe that such an act can only erode the credibility of the government further and may be seen as “contempt of court.”
There are a total of 56 F.M. radio stations in the country out of which 16 are operating in the Kathmandu valley.
On this occasion, CEHURDES would also like to call upon the Nepalese government to immediately return the communications equipment that it seized from the office of Kantipur F.M., the leading private sector radio station in the capital.
At around midnight on October 21, four vans of police, accompanied by MoIC officials, raided the Kantipur F.M. office and seized eight sets of communications equipment used to uplink its transmission to its eastern regional center via satellite. The station’s eastern regional transmission has been disrupted due to the government action.
CEHURDES has already condemned the government’s act of raiding the office of Kantipur F.M. and seizing the equipment. We hold that it was a blatant violation of the very notion of rule of law in the country.
