LAHORE: ‘Corrupt’ customs officials like Khalid Umer and Dost Mohammad have openly started blackmailing genuine importers through different tactics. These corrupt officials use an illegal news website as a tool to threaten these importers by publishing fake news against them, putting their repute at danger.
Sources said the frontman of this illegal website declares his website as a newspaper but he did not get any declaration to run a newspaper, so it becomes illegal to run an unregistered news website for the sake of blackmailing genuine importers. There are lengthy legal formalities and background checks mandatory under the law before any newspaper can be launched. Law does not allow any unqualified or criminal background person to launch a newspaper. Running such shady news websites is entirely ‘criminal’ in nature.
Sources said that actual owners of this illegal website are some ‘corrupt’ customs officials like Khalid Umer and Dost Mohammad who provide their full backing and support to it. Such customs staff mafia is using a frontman to run and manage the illegal website. They have chosen an illiterate frontman without proper schooling as owner of the news website so that they can get their fake stories published without any hurdle by the frontman. Whereas the law is very strict that owner of newspapers should necessarily be graduate and also an experienced journalist. Frontman of this website is not a journalist so he does not have any idea of journalistic ethics. It is strictly prohibited to run such kind of websites to damage repute and status of genuine importers and senior customs officers.
Sources said these ‘corrupt’ officers run their illegal website merely to blackmail importers and their senior customs officials. These ‘corrupt’ officers threaten the genuine importers to pay bribe to them otherwise they will publish news against them on their website.
Sources said importers from different cities of the country have decided to lodge more than 100 FIRs against this ‘criminal’ website and their beneficiaries including customs officials like Khalid Umer, Port Qasim and Dost Mohammad, Karachi East, who are using this illegal website to blackmail importers.
