High-reach content creators should act more responsibly: Zahed

Prime Minister’s Information and Broadcasting Adviser Zahed Ur Rahman on Tuesday expressed hope that people with high reach and viral traction including content creator Salman Muqtadir will act more responsibly in the future.

“I hope people like Salman Muqtadir, who have a huge reach and viral traction, will be more responsible,” he said while responding to questions from reporters at a press briefing at Secretariat on the progress of various government activities.

A journalist referred to allegations of extortion following an attack on Salman Muqtadir’s studio and asked what steps the government would take to prevent the spread of misinformation, noting that Muqtadir initially alleged that BNP men had demanded extortion money but later said that no one had asked him for money.

In response, Zahed said the government was speaking sympathetically about Muqtadir as was affected by the incident and was subjected to an attack.

“Salman Muqtadir has been a victim, so we are speaking about him with sympathy. We are sympathetic to him. But we also need to take into consideration how he described the matter in that situation,” he said.

Referring to a Facebook post by the Jamaat-e-Islami ameer, the Information Adviser said the Jamaat leader blamed the government over the alleged extortion after watching Muqtadir’s video.

He said the post is still available on the Jamaat leader’s verified Facebook account.

Zahed said the government is not defending any act of violence and acknowledged that such an incident should not have happened.

“No kind of violence has happened for which the government is making excuses. It should not have happened, and it should have been prevented. Even now, at least, the government’s responsibility is to ensure that justice is delivered quickly. You can see that steps are being taken,” he said.

He said Muqtadir later withdrew from his earlier statement and acknowledged that the incident was not actually occurred in the way he had initially described it.

The adviser also said that establishments other than Muqtadir’s studio were vandalised.

“But that post is still there on the opposition leader’s Facebook account. Not only him, many prominent leaders of the NCP have also made highly aggressive statements, using objectionable language targeting not only the BNP but also the BNP chairman and the head of this government. None of those statements has been removed,” he said.

Describing misinformation as a major global challenge, Zahed said the issue of misinformation was also being given importance in the theme of International Right to Information Day.

The Information Adviser said there is scope to address misinformation both by raising public awareness and bringing the issue within the legal framework.

“We are actually talking about the future. There is scope to raise public awareness and also to bring these issues within the legal framework. As you know, work is underway on a law, the Cyber Security Act. We hope these matters can be dealt with within that legal framework,” he said.