In the pretext of asking questions, a former press officer of Begum Khaleda Zia, weaved a display of lies at US State Department briefing falsely attributing a quote to the foreign minister, a move academics say further exposes an absence of fact-checking process in such a press conference.
Posing as journalist, Musfiqul Fazal Ansery, before asking his questions, gave two paragraphs of observations, that journalists consider, lacks any sort of objectivity and deals with outright lies that should have been avoided by any professional journalists.
“Indian election interference has also been surfaced to keep Sheikh Hasina in power,the foreign minister asserts India’s support for the victory”, said Ansery while in reality the foreign minister has only acknowledged all the nations that accepted the public mandate in polls in Bangladesh.
So the attempt to lend credence to the allegation of Indian intervention referring to Bangladesh foreign minister is a classic act of activism, no way can be defined as journalism as he was seeking response to these questions also, added senior journalists.
Importantly, the portal he refers to get the press accreditation cards has long earned the notoriety as a vanguard of disinformation, tailored with opposition backed campaign.
Goes by the name Justnews, the Portal’s content exposed another wave of false narratives that seeks to offer a credible outlook, attempts to protect arsonists, blowing error riddled reports out of proportion and absolve Tarique Rahman from hiscrimes. Earlier, Ansery also falsely quoted the prime minister triggering a response from the State Department that back then academics pointed out a sheer act of activismbased on lies and driven by political agendas.
On the other hand, the same Ansery can be seen falsely attributing to State Department officials and making claims about US response against the government, echoed by the opposition to justify their violent act of arson attacks and undemocratic demand like boycott election campaign.
Ansery for his projection of “independent media outlets” as “pro government machinery” at a US State Department briefing, which they said was intended to further intimidate media outlet owners and journalists to “favor the opposition” ahead of the election.
According to Prof Tabiur Rahman, the pattern is very much ominous.
In front of state Department officer he misquoted the government and out of the state department room, the guy can be found peddling lies misquoting the US officials.
No way can we define such activity as journalism, claimed Tabiur.
"Such brazen abuse of enjoying the privileges of attending press conferences at state department with tall claims of US backing to fuel arsonattacks should not go unabated”, added Tabiur.
In reference to a series of past false assertions by Ansarey, a senior former professor of mass communication and journalism department Golam Rahman said "Such sort of campaign should not be treated as work of journalism— activists can run motivated campaign — in the wake of such activism, objective work of reportage comes at play. Independent work of journalismis a good tool to fight out such menace".