Working Journalists' Act

 Minister for Information and Communications Krishna Bahadur Mahara recently said that the government is planning to implement the regulations concerning the Working Journalists' Act. At long last, the ministry seems prepared to implement the recommendations of the Working Journalists' Remuneration Determination Committee (WJRDC). According to Minister Mahara, the regulations are ready and that they would come into effect once the cabinet seals their approval. Working journalists constantly face two major risks while fulfilling their duty. They, on the one hand, face constant threat to their lives and on the other the risk of losing their jobs if they failed to dance to the tune of media owners.


It has been learnt that more than 90 per cent of the media persons working in the privately-owned media houses have not been given their appointment letters. Most of them are hired on contract basis and may be relieved of their services at the owner's pleasure. Many journalists working with the print and broadcasting media have been demanding permanent appointment, standard remuneration and other facilities. The absence of job guarantee has frequently sparked conflict between the management and employees' union. In the recent past, a similar situation emerged when employees of some media houses protested and the management came forward in verbal as well as legal tactical moves to deny the demands raised by the agitating employees. To tackle the situation, the government and the Federation of Nepalese Journalists (FNJ) had reached an agreement to jointly act for the protection of journalists, employees and media houses and guarantee press freedom in the country.

All the working journalists and media rights groups including the Federation of Nepalese Journalists have long been demanding implementation of the Working journalists' regulations, which will make it mandatory for owners of media outlets to provide journalists with service contracts and guarantee them standard minimum salary and other benefits. For this reason, the Interim Legislature-Parliament in August, 2007, had unanimously passed the bill amending the "Working Journalists Act" as a step towards improving the working condition of the scribes.

The law clearly states that no journalists shall be assigned their duties without giving them an appointment letter. The major provisions in the amended act were: fixing the basic salary of journalists, allowing the media to appoint only 15 per cent of the total journalists on contract basis and ensuring the right to form a trade union.

Provision of the recruitment of journalists only through open competition, appointment of registrar to monitor and manage the implementation of the act and a committee to determine basic salary were also included in it. As per the amendment, the government had constituted the WJRDC. Other provisions were: ensuring the capacity building of journalists and of awarding punishment to any media house that violated the Act.

The mandatory provision for media houses is to allocate one per cent annual income for capacity building purposes. A media house is also liable to bear the expenses/compensation if a journalist meets with an accident or death, or happens to incur loss/damage of his/her individual property in the course of professional assignment. If implemented properly, this will assume special significance in view of the fact that many media organisations including big ones in the country - both the print and electronic- do not seem to have followed the provisions with much seriousness. As a result, many journalists and employees continue to work in an atmosphere of job insecurity. Besides, employees in some of the media houses are learnt to have been deprived of their salaries for months on end.

Obviously, small media houses such as weeklies and community FM radios could be given some more time as they might not be in a position to fulfil all these provisions immediately. But big media houses must be made to follow the regulations immediately. It is sad that the previous governments have failed to enforce the law for so long. As the Legislature-Parliament has already passed the law, the government should show full political will to implement it, along with the necessary regulations. The government should not give in to the pressure that may come from vested interests.

If the government is honestly committed to safeguarding freedom of the press, journalists should first be protected through job guarantee including the right to be provided with a proper environment for the development of their professional skills and

ability. This environment is also necessary to check misuse of professional right and neglect of objectivity in news reports. Hence, the government, which is the result of the CA election and which carries the mandate of Jana Andolan II, should demonstrate its political will to implement the Act immediately.

Chalise is a litterateur and journalist