Retarded individuals, masquerading as media experts, used to come to our countries, curry favour with people in power and warn them against the press, likening this press to a monster, which feasts upon thrones.
The sorry thing was that our officials used to listen attentively to these people, believing whatever they said to them. This was why demands for the creation of a union for journalists always fell on deaf ears under the ruse that journalists worked in politics and in this capacity they cannot be compared with humanitarian organisations.
The general perception was that if emancipated, journalists can turn into devils that would destabilise society.
This raises questions about what might have gone wrong with our brothers in Qatar. Can they still harbour the same ridiculous perception?
Can the same retarded team of experts be still in control, spreading the view that journalists are nothing but devils?
If this is not the case, how can we justify official reluctance to allow journalists to have their own union?
Whether what the journalists want to have is a union or an association does not matter at the end of the day. What matters, however, is the desire of Qatari newspapermen to have a legal club enabling them to have their own places in Arab, regional, and international press associations.
This is the utmost Qatari journalists can aspire to. Qatari journalists have the right to deal with the outside world under state support. The state should deal with journalists as citizens and contributors to the formation and the defence of its interests, not mere devils that should be marginalised.
But why do not leading Qatari journalists seriously persist in their desire to establish a press syndicate?
Several associations have already come to being, including ones for charity and humanitarian purposes, and one for pigeons soon. What are these leading journalists waiting for then?
What is the problem? What are the forces opposed to the establishment of an association for Qatari journalists? Is it ignorance about the importance of this association, or failure on the part of leading journalists to make the voice of their colleagues heard to officials and defending their rights?
An association will help Qatari journalists be part of the world. It will take them from the spectators’ benches and give them the right to attend events everywhere, instead of being barred from entering, because they do not have permits from a guild that was nipped in the bud.
