2 May 2010 - A journalist by choice, Gulistan Ghalib needs no introduction in eastern Afghanistan.

Having worked as a journalist for almost 40 years in Afghanistan’s most difficult times, spanning from Soviet occupation to the post-Taliban years and beyond, his life of 56 years has, no doubt, been a true rollercoaster.

A 15-year-old boy from Jalalabad, who went to Kabul in the early 1970s seeking a job with Radio Afghanistan, the only mass media in the country at that time, Mr Ghalib rose to the post of director of the board of the Jalalabad office of the radio station after the branch was set up in 1982. In Kabul, he recalls working in the “drama section.”

As Mr Ghalib’s active journalism career started finding ground in the 1980s and 1990s, so did Afghanistan’s most turbulent and difficult times. His life has flowed according to the social and political course taken by his country.

A rocket hit him in 1989, causing injuries in his head and legs. The Taliban – after taking control of the country in 1996 – fired him from his position of broadcasting director of the state-controlled Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA), besides stopping television broadcasting.

After losing hope of returning to journalism during the Taliban regime, he moved to his birthplace in a village called Shaga near Jalalabad and continued his village life, bought nine sheep, and became a shepherd in 1997.

“At that time, I thought my career was over,” said Mr Ghalib, on a recent morning after he finished recording a talk programme for Sharq television, in Jalalabad, where he currently hosts talk shows on current affairs.

The day’s guest was Dr Rafiullah Baidar, the eastern regional head of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, and topics included the role and the effectiveness of the commission, transitional justice and corruption.

After he learned that the Taliban were after him, the journalist-turned-shepherd quietly sold everything he owned for a mere US$ 2,000 and fled his village along with his wife, two sons and four daughters to Pakistan, where he would spend two years as a refugee in 1999.

“I didn’t go to Peshawar (where most Afghan refugees went) because there were too many Talibs,” said Mr Ghalib, dressed in a Western-style suit and tie, adding, “rather, I went to inner hinterlands of Lahore.”

After the Taliban were toppled from power, Mr Ghalib also returned from Pakistan and headed straight to Jalalabad and took up the position of television director at RTA in December 2001.

One year later, he was promoted to the overall director of RTA and continued in that position until 2007, when Nangarhar Governor Gul Agha Sherzai fired him after “RTA covered a news report about corruption involved in the release of perpetrators in an abduction case.”

The man of conviction, who draws inspiration from the likes of Mahmood Tarzi (the first journalist of Afghanistan), Indian novelist, author and social reformer Munshi Premchand, and Soviet-era writers Lev Tolstoy and Maxim Gorky, said he is saddened by some “unethical journalists” and the vices surrounding Afghanistan’s modern-day journalism.

“A very good question” was his first response followed by a long pause when asked about his assessment of journalism in Afghanistan.

“Journalism shouldn’t be a source of income generation. Journalists should be driven by their instincts,” he said, and continued that “very few might be good in Afghanistan, but most are not because they are working for money and can’t reflect the reality.”

“I have worked for many decades as a journalist, but I am still living a poor life economically because I have never accepted a bribe, which was offered to me several times in my life,” said one of the shining stars of Afghanistan’s Fourth Estate, who was also was one of the journalists who began the first journalist association in Afghanistan in the 1980s.

Sharq television, where he works now, pays him 15,000 Afs (US$ 300) a month.

As the world celebrates World Press Freedom Day on 3 May with the theme “Freedom of Information,” there is widespread fear among media persons like Mr Ghalib of attacks on the media.

However, Afghanistan has made significant strides in the media sector in recent years. In the 2009 Press Freedom Index of Reporters Without Borders (RSF), a Paris-based press freedom watchdog, Afghanistan at 149 among 173 countries – a progress from 156 in 2008 – is ahead of Pakistan (159), Iran (172), Russia (153), Uzbekistan (160), Sri Lanka (162), Saudi Arabia (163) and China (168).

“When the war was raging (in the 80s and 90s), the situation was very bad – probably worse than the Second World War. Everyone wasn’t too sure if they would be alive tomorrow, so they didn’t think too much about their own future, let alone journalism,” he said of the past.

“Now, this war is worse than that war. There was a distinction between the warring parties in that war. Now, there is no distinction. Journalists are under pressure from both the Government and insurgents. They can’t reflect realities because they will be killed. Still we have some hope for the future of journalism in Afghanistan because we are supported by the international community."

Mr Ghalib regrets that he couldn’t realize his wish of starting a “truly independent” radio, television and newspaper dedicated to true journalism.

“Existence of several media outlets and the firm support provided by the international community are extremely good. It may pave the way for empowerment of journalism in Afghanistan,” he expresses optimism.

By Tilak Pokharel and Shafiqullah Waak, UNAMA