Mass media, whether printed or audio-visual, are considered ways for expressing opinions and enlightening society. These days, the media are under fire, prompting many to say there have been attempts to restrict and gag the freedom of expression. Late president Gamal Abdel-Nasser oversaw the nationalisation of the media in 1961. Strict governmental censorship and licensing laws meant that the State controlled what people read and watched, while private media investment was impossible at the time. The advent of pan-Arab satellite TV channels such as al-Jazeera in the 1990s provided Egyptians with high-budget programming and more open talk shows on social and political issues. This subsequently produced changes in the nation's media landscape, according to BBC News. More recently, there has been a surge in the number of privately owned outlets and a consequent dismantling of many decades of State control. Television remains the most popular medium in Egypt and audience numbers are increasing rapidly. Nearly two-thirds of Egyptians also listen to the radio on a daily basis, with news and religious programming being particularly popular. However, all media experts stress that there is a lack of confidence between media men and the public, which should be tackled in a way that enables them to do their task without intervention from parties not concerned with the media. Mahmoud el-Warwary, a broadcaster with the news satellite channel Al-Arabia, has called for eliminating the controversial points and the articles that restrict the freedoms in the Constitution, in order to ensure credibility and confidence between the mass media and the people. He says that all parties concerned with the media should work together to come up with a media code of ethics, in order to preserve the media's work of publishing the facts and revealing corruption in all State institutions. El-Warwary adds that there should be periodical reports of self-evaluation made available to the public, revealing wrong, dishonest practices and swiftly rectifying them. He stresses that the media people themselves should strive to correct some errors in the profession, purifying their practices of any deviations, while presenting draft legislation on civil liberties, in co-operation with lawyers, media professors, intellectuals and opinion makers. This is the only way to end a battle which no-one will win, he affirmed. Dr Doria Sharaf Eddin, a prominent media woman, told el-Messa newspaper that the media are suffering from a grave injustice nowadays. Some people want the media to turn a blind eye to all the political divisions and the violence happening in Egypt at this critical stage. This notion does not accord with the role of the media, which should be tools for conveying what is happening impartially and honestly. She attributed the problem to a poor performance at the level of the State, with the antagonists and pro-regime activists attacking the media and describing them as corrupt. Dr Doria explained that the formation of a national council for media is a must, so that all media people, especially the veterans, can systematically monitor and track the performance of the media. She also called for the need to ensure the independence of the State-owned media according to the Government's structural changes to legislative and institutional frameworks. The number of newspapers in Egypt has soared to more than 500, most of which are independent. The State-owned press operates a system of self-censorship, but the sharp rise in the number of private and independent titles means the ‘red lines' observed by press sources have largely disappeared. Yasser Hamed, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, told The Egyptian Gazette that the mass media do injustice to the Muslim Brothers, accusing them of tailoring the regulations for their good as well as having militias everywhere. “But this is groundless since, if they had militias, they could use them to defend themselves and protect their offices nationwide. These offices have been ransacked in the past months of violence. “At least their militias, if they had any, could have protected the Brotherhood's main headquarters in Moqattam, which were attacked on Friday by opposition activists who are at odds with the Muslim Brotherhood (MB)," he argued. Hamed called on the mass media to be just and fair in conveying the news concerning the MB, as they do with the opposition. Nermine al-Azraq, Professor at the Faculty of Mass Media, Cairo University, indicates that we need many regulations and limits, as freedom is not an end in itself but a means to achieve something better. “The world's big countries have regulations controlling the media, as well as organisations which organise the media practices in the country, in order to preserve the credibility of the media. “We are in dire need of such regulations for pressmen, in order to avoid the conflicts and disputes facing media coverage in its different forms," stresses Dr Nermine.
