The Executive Committee of the APNS at its meeting held on Thursday at Karachi adopted the Annual Report for the year 2022-23 as well as the Annual Accounts for the year 2022. The Executive Committee appreciated the Secretariat’s efforts in recovering current and old dues. The members of the Executive Committee considered the state of print media freedom of press in the country.
Mr. Nadeem-ur-Rehman Memon, Secretary Information, Sindh attended the meeting of the Executive Committee on special invitation by the President. The members apprised him on the problems faced by member publications based in Sindh. The Secretary acknowledged the issue of non-payment of non-budgeted dues for previous years as well as delayed payments of budgeted dues and assured that the Sindh Information Department intends to sort out the issues and have requested the provincial government to allocate a certain amount in the budget to streamline the payment system. He reiterated that a tri-partite reconciliation to verify the old outstanding as well as budgeted and non-budgeted dues will be completed in 15 days.
The Executive Committee expressed its concern over the delay in payments by the Federal as well as Sindh, Punjab and KPK provincial governments. The members emphasized that publications are going through acute financial hardships because of non-payment of these dues. The Secretary General, Ms. Nazafreen Saigol Lakhani informed them of ongoing discussions with the Federal and provincial governments and commitments made by both governments to work with the APNS to expedite the recovery of dues. The Secretary General informed the Executive Committee members that she is exerting all efforts to ensure recovery of dues as soon as possible.
The following aldo attended the meeting: Sarmad Ali, President, Shahab Zuberi, Vice President, Nazafreen Saigol Lakhani, Secretary General, Mohsin Bilal, Joint Secretary, Bilal Farooqui (Daily Aghaz), Najamuddin Sheikh (Daily Deyanat), Muhammad Younus Mehar (Daily Halchal), Kazi Mustafa (Daily Ibrat), Syed Akbar Tahir (Daily Jasarat), Javed Mehr Shamsi (Daily Kaleem), Mirza Zafar Javaid (Daily Kawish), Muhammad Manzoor Rana (Daily Mashriq, Quetta).
