Communication strategy of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Government in Pandemic: a case study of Corona virus (COVID-19)

Objective: In every country, authorities develop strategies for the awareness, education and information at the time of a crisis. This study explored the communication strategies of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Government of Pakistan during the Corona virus (COVID-19)pandemic. Methods: Data was collected from the information department of KP. Secondary data was analyzed which was collected from the main information department Peshawar and the regional offices: Mardan, Abatabad, DI Khan, Malakand and Swat. Data was presented in a tabulated form in frequency distribution. Findings: The information department has used all type of methods, tactics and sources of information for the education, awareness and information of the public regarding Coronavirus (COVID-19) and made it possible to control the outbreak to a greater extent. KP government used all kind of media communication strategies including print media, radio, information departments, social media, videos and public service message for creating awareness among public. Recommendations: It is recommended that KP government until now has applied impressive communication strategies. It has been suggested to the government to use local influential public figures and places for the awareness of the people to overcome and control the pandemic.


Introduction
The mass communication strategies have to be assessed for their effectiveness for health risk communications to cover diverse sections of public to generate cooperation with the governing agencies so as to contain and confront the pandemic. Educating the mass https://www.indjst.org/ about self-protection and risk factors, means and ways of implementing the same simultaneously bringing the trust in author-

Strategic communication in Crisis
Broadly speaking crises are of two types; natural crises and man-made crises. Natural crises and disasters are flood, tsunami, earthquake etc, while man-made contain organizational crises, militancy, terrorism, corruption, psychological warfare etc.
At the time of crisis, the strategic communicator and experts should have the quality to protect and defend the individual, community, nation and organization reputation and familiarity internationally.
The role of strategic communication in a crisis centers on the management of conflict between the organization and its important stakeholders (10) . An organization thrives or survives by focusing and managing the stakeholders (11) . " There are stages of crisis when it occurs including prodromal, acute, chronic and crisis resolution crisis (12) . Five different stages of crisis containing detection of crisis are; prevention or preparation, containment, recovery and learning stage (13) .
Crisis gives predictable results which largely destroy the reputation of services and products as well as the financial condition of the workers and organization. The author classified the kinds of crisis in misconduct, natural disasters, management failure, rumor, mega damages, technical collapse, human errors, mistakes and workplace violence (14) .

Significance of Strategic Communication in Pakistan
The significance of strategic communication lies in the fact that it connects the theoretical and practical sides of life connecting professionals from various walks of life and to the society as a whole. Without such effective methods instilling ideas and information across different factions of society is not possible. During an emergency the appropriate coordination of strategies https://www.indjst.org/ become therefore indispensable.
It is a fact that media is the mirror of society, so the journalist apply the strategic communication tactics to connect the people and show the society problems and issues. The journalists also need to portray the developmental activities of the society to the public.  was declared as world epidemic and named Covid-19 on February 11, 2020, which is a type of Severe Acute Respiratory tract infecting virus-2' (SARS-CoV-2) (15) . The epidemic cases have been confirmed from Karachi and Islamabad on February 26, 2020 in Pakistan (16) .

Coronavirus (COVID-19 Situation in Pakistan
Total 159 new cases were confirmed, 35 deaths and total nationwide cases were identified as 2450 in last 24 hoursconfirmed positive and 53,069 death were confirmed globally. Total number of regions and countries affected were 181 (17) .

Method of Data collection
Secondary data was collected from the Provincial Government of Khyber Pakhtunwa about Corona virus-19. For better understating and authentic information the researcher collected data from Press of Information and Public Relations Department Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province Pakistan. In this regard the researcher contacted different authorities of the department as well as regional offices in province including Mardan, Malakand, Swat, Kohat, Abbottabad, DI Khan and Bannu, whereas they released 820 handouts from February 26, 2020 to April 02, 2020 to different media outlets in the country. Data was presented in tabulated form , while research questions were supported with frequency distribution.
Information and public relations department government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is a main provincial gate way of the government communication to the masses. Since its inception in 1946, one year prior to the emergence of Pakistan, the same department plays a role to bridge the government and public relations and inform the masses about activities of government for the welfare of public of province. A dedicated and automated media cell is operating in civil secretariat of Peshawar which monitors the print and electronic media contents for knowing the negative and positive perception of media regarding the incumbent government and then reciprocate the version of government through media. Likewise a press secretary unit performs duty at chief minister Secretariat which has the responsibilities of media management public relation and press coverage of the chief minister while a same subsidiary unit of PRO office also exists in Governor House. Apart from that the department deputes a PRO to each department cabinet member and speaker for the media communication and PR responsibilities of the same authorities. The department hold an office at federal capital Islamabad to perform the responsibilities on behalf of the department while 7 field formations operates in the province at regional. These formations called the Regional Information Offices situated at Mardan, Malakand, Swat, Kohat, Abbottabad, DI Khan and Bannu. Research has shown that community media and broadcasting is a key for the awareness of rural communities and with this analogy the government flourishing the installation of FM radios in the province as it is a major source of information, education and public awareness in the rural areas of the province. Till now 04 Radio Stations owned by information department, one each in Peshawar, Mardan Kohat and Swat are running its broadcasts while due to the merger of erstwhile FATA a number of radio stations from FATA is also transferred in the control of provincial information department.

Results and Discussion
The findings were presented in the following tabulations; https://www.indjst.org/ *Data was dispersed, that's way didn't provided **Data provided by the regional office authorities(Feb, 26 till April, 2, 2020) Table 1 demonstrates overall information disseminated through various ways by the government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) 45% through print media, 0.46% by prints Advertisements, 3.12% through press conferences, 9.38% by short videos, 34.42% through info graphics and public service messages, 3.12% by live streams through facebook and YouTube, 0.78% via social media interactive sessions and 3.59% information were spread to alert short service messages by cell phones. While, information related Corona virus-19 was disseminated after every 15 minutes through FM radio from different parts of the province. Table also illustrates the regional offices information strategies about corona-19 , their issues of 546 handouts, 439 images, 309 social media posts & images and 264 social media videos & messages from February 26 to April 2, 2020.

Radio Awareness regarding Corona-19
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Government also tuned radio broadcasting for the awareness and information of the public from its regional offices. The details are following;   Table 2 shows the progress of the Peshawar based radio. Pakhtunkhwa Radio Peshawar goes on air 16 hours a day. It has suspended its routine transmission and COVID-19 pandemic is highlighted in almost every program on daily basis. It has 22 different PSAs in different languages including Urdu, Pashto, Persian, Chitrali and Wazir dialect. These PSAs are aired every 5 minutes, totaling to 150 times a day. It has aired dedicated programs on COVID-19 with a total of 50 hours since February 26, 2020. The Table also demonstrates the progress of the Pakhtunkhwa radio Mardan. Furthermore, all presenters and RJs have been directed to create awareness regarding COVID-19 in their routine programs. Thus the issue is being highlighted throughout the transmission on daily basis.
To create awareness in general Public regarding the Corona Virus spread and to facilitate the general masses regarding their health/medical issues at their homes, after the closure of OPD services in Govt. hospitals and private clinics, the following activities were carried out through radio Swat. The transmission of Radio Pakhtunkhwa FM 98, Swat were increased from 08:00 Hours to 12:00 Hours daily. RQ1: How many sources the government of Pakistan used as strategic communication for Corona-19?   Table 3 illustrates the methods of information whereas 85.84% used print media, 1.47% consumed social media, 5.89% information was given through press conferences, 6.78% by cell phones alerts and FM radios were used after every 15 minutes for this purpose.On the other side government of KP also prepared TVCs for different televisions and social media awareness. Print media played an effective role in pandemic risk communication (18,19) Print media framed influenza epidemic positively and effectively which controlled the large effects of the crisis .
"Results show that media attention was immense, that news content stressed threat over precautionary measures, while the pattern of coverage tonality remained nebulous due to conflicting findings. The present review also revealed a critical gap in existing knowledge about the tone of media coverage on H1N1, and discusses implications for future research on dramatization of public health risks by the media"(p1) (20) .
Youtube was also an effective source of information at the time of pandemic (21) Twitter is an easy and successful sources of information (22) . Pandemics in the age of Twitter: content analysis of Tweets during the 2009 H1N1 outbreak. Press conference is a very easy and mass audience source of information at the time of disease outbreaks (23) .
RQ2: What kinds of tactics and methods have been applied as strategic communication method by government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for Corona-19?  Table 4 shows various tactics applied by the KP government for the awareness of information about Corona-19 that 1.86% was prepared Info graphics & Pubic Services message, 82.08% was news stories, 7.46% was print media and 8.58% was column and articles. Every possible tactics of information was used for the global Tobacco epidemic in 2013, whereas all kind of advertisement and promotional information was banned (24) . Online services and social media contents were generated to communication with people at time of crisis (25) . "Mutual learning is not necessarily a good description of the movement of policies and suggest that analogies to disease and epidemics may be a useful way of thinking about what is happening" (26) . Table 4 also demonstrates methods applied by the KP government for easy understanding of information regarding Corona-19 that 22.47% information were given by press conferences, 67.41 through short videos, 5.61% by social media interactive sessions and 4.49% through FM radio clinics which were established in Peshawar, Mardan, Abatabad and Swat regions. During pandemic (H1N1) 2009 influenza (pH1N1) most effective sources of information were schools, friends, family, health professional and officials as well as media (27) . Traditional and information technologies were the methods for information and surveillance in epidemic (28) . Facebook is an effective source of information method in Zika viroius outbreak at the time Social media is very effective source of information in epidemic such as Corona-19 . Traditional media and social media were applied for information of public about Corona-19.

Conclusion
It is concluded that in this critical situation like other governments, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa used all kind of sources, tactics and methods of information, awareness and educational programes about Corona-19. In this regard handout, images, public https://www.indjst.org/ services messages were disseminated through different media outlet for general information about . Special Radio programs were transmitted and clinic started for the cause and effect of the disease. It is also concluded that government is using every possible tactics for the education of public to control and overcome the epidemic. On the bases of KP culture, it is suggested to the government to start campaign in Masjids (worship areas) and Hujras (Guesthouses) through spiritual leaders and opinion leaders as they are more influential in the areas to control the situation in the province of KP.