Tolerating Dissent.

By wading into the debate surrounding the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority's (Pemra) directive baring television anchors from appearing as 'experts' in their own and other channels the Prime Minister has muddied the waters further. Not only has he taken the side of Pemra and stands opposed to the massive backlash against the directive, his comments make it seem as if the directive was sent out at the behest of the government - which brings the independence of the impartial regulator in question.

While chairing a meeting of the federal cabinet, Imran expressed resentment over tweets of Minister for Science and Technology Fawad Chaudhry, Human Rights Minister Dr Shireen Mazari and MNA Asad Umar against the Perma move and warned them against criticising the government decisions 'openly'.

This statement is problematic on many levels. It asserts that government ministers and ruling party members are to take directions sent from higher up with any question or dissent; there is no space for reasonable debate or detraction. This is undoubtedly undemocratic. Each representative of the people in the Parliament is mandated to exercise their own judgement and rationality to represent his constituency to the best of their abilities; they are not meant to slavishly follow the orders of the party leaders as if they were in an autocratic set up...