Politicising the Bangladeshi media

Bangladeshi media entities are becoming the new plethora of political activities in the country amid a nationwide ban on politics.

Members of both the leading political parties, Awami League and BNP are competing towards controlling the Bangladeshi media. Although the Awami League has remained lacking in its own media propaganda tools, it has recently become active towards obtaining licences for new public media entities.

A number of BNP managed television stations to obtain broadcast licenses during the past five years of the BNP-Jamaat rule, includes; NTV, RTV (Owned by BNP leader Musaddeq Ali Falu, now in prison facing corruption charges), Channel One (Owned by Gias Uddin Al Mamun, now in prison facing corruption charges), Boishakhi TV (owned by BNP leader Mirza Abbas, now in prison facing corruption charges), Bangla Vision (owned by DCC Mayor Sadeq Hussain Khoka), CSB (owned by Salauddin Quader Chowdhury, now in prison facing corruption charges), SNTV (Owned by Nasir Uddin Ahmed Pintu and Salauddin Ahmed, now in prison facing corruption charges), Desh TV (owned by BNP leader Mushfiqur Rahman), Diganta TV (Owned by Jamaat leader Mir Quashem Ali) and Islamic TV (Owned by Khaleda Zia’s brother Sayeed Iskander).

Many jailed politicians remain in control of such media companies, which are being used to broadcast party political agendas. The current military-backed Bangladeshi administration has been keen to keep their hands of such companies, as a show of tolerance towards free-speech.