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Reporting by the media is not a PR campaign

Public relations companies seem to be ruling the roost thus widening the gap between governments, organisations and the public.

Constant awareness campaigns - on the negative and dangerous practices and on the positive aspects - are essential for a community's development.
The same holds true for government policies and rules formulated for the benefit of the people. It is the responsibility of the media to rise to the occasion to propagate such campaigns. The media has a dual role to play here - make the public aware of the changes and demand clarification from the government on unclear policies.
However, this does not seem to be working. Public relations companies seem to be ruling the roost thus widening the gap between governments, organisations and the public.
It is important that awareness campaigns meant for the development of the country are made more effective. However, this truth seems to have evaded the media which has refrained from such efforts throughout the year making campaigns scarce. Campaigns against drugs and reckless driving, and on the back-to-school season received little attention this year.
This lack of interest seems to have resulted from a shift in priorities which is rather unfortunate considering that such campaigns go a long way in making people aware of the prevalent situations and policies. However, it is heartening that young people, take up some independent campaigns which have helped raise awareness.
The past few years have shown that social media as a vehicle for promotion has not brought in the desired results, thus making it important to reexamine the strategies. Time and technology have brought about changes which have spilled over to the functioning of print media. With constraints of space, print media is now concentrating on real content giving a miss to frivolous news.
Newspapers are not here to promote corporates; they are here to provide news that is genuine. When the aim is to furnish proper information selected by credible editors, there is no room for fake news or free campaigns. Only tenable campaigns will be promoted. But it is important that such campaigns are repeated for forgetfulness is a human trait.
- malzarooni@khaleejtimes.com