University honour for Asia-Pacific broadcast leader

Broadcasting leader Moneeza Hashmi has been awarded a senior role at Asia’s largest university for women.

Mrs Hashmi has been appointed the inaugural holder of the Mohtrama Shaheed Benazir Bhutto Chair for Peace, Reconciliation and Development at Pakistan’s Lahore College for Women University (LCWU). She is President of the Commonwealth Broadcasting Association (CBA) and General Manager of International Relations at ABU member Hum TV, based in Karachi.

In her new role at LCWU, Mrs Hashmi will strengthen the university’s links with national and international organisations as well as working closely with the institution’s mass communications department to develop curriculum and research opportunities. LCWU was established in 1922 and has 10,000 undergraduate and post-graduate students.

LCWU Vice-Chancellor Prof Sabiha Mansoor said she was pleased and honoured to have Mrs Hashmi in the new role.

“Moneeza brings with her years of dedicated service for development of women and is a strong advocate of rights of the marginalised segments of society, to enable them to access education and employment.”

The CBA said Mrs Hashmi has four decades of experience in electronic media and contributions to the field of development and gender, having served on committees in several countries on promoting positive images of women in the media.

ABU Secretary General Dr Javad Mottaghi welcomed Mrs Hashmi’s appointment.

“Moneeza is a true professional and has been an active and energetic media champion for the rights of women and the marginalised,” he said.

The chair is named in honour of Benazir Bhutto, who was Prime Minister of Pakistan from 1988 to 1990 and from 1993 to 1996 and was the first woman to lead an Islamic nation. She was assassinated in 2007.