Legislation shouldn’t curb freedom of expression: Mian Zahid Hussain

Lahore: Former provincial minister Mian Zahid Hussain on Wednesday said cybercrime bill should but promote rights and liberties and reduce incidents of crimes. The proposed piece of legislation should support use of internet without which human and national development will remain a far cry, he said.

Mian Zahid Hussain said that democracy is all about fundamental rights, civil liberties, freedom of expression and right to information which should be protected to make the bill acceptable to all the stakeholders. He said that public interests should be safeguarded in the new legislation and reservations of those sectors who were not consulted should be given consideration. Increasing number of people and business are relying on the cyberspace in Pakistan while the number of internet users in the world has already surpassed three billion, he added.

He said that 192 countries are providing 3G services catering for half of the global population while 102 countries have 4G networks, while 71 percent of the world’s population would be using mobile internet by 2019. Over one million applications have been developed by manufacturers of operating systems while of apps has exceeded browsing on PCs in many countries. These apps are of great help to governments, masses, business community, farmers, and students. Internet has played basic role in making world a global village and its exponential growth allows it to ease and transform people’s life and increase their knowledge.

The business leader said that internet revolution came to Pakistan after privatization of PTCL which introduced high speed internet, new technologies and products.

The company continue to be the backbone for the country’s telecommunication infrastructure despite the arrival of a dozen other telecommunication corporations. PTCL manages and operates around two thousand telephone exchanges across the country, providing the largest fixed-line network apart from the data and backbone services.

The introduction of 3G and 4G technologies in Pakistan helped masses and business community besides generating revenue of over two billion dollars, he said.

Available material, programmes, websites and other services of the internet are multiplying with an amazing pace revolutionizing the technology and lives which must considered, he demanded.