SNAPSHOTS

Links to countries:
Botswana, Burundi, Central African Republic, Comoros, Djibouti,
Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal,
Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia


BOTSWANA

• In August, Rodrick Mukumbira, a Zimbabwean who had been working in Botswana for the Ngami Times, Agence France-Presse, and IRIN, was forced to leave the country after the government withdrew his work permits. Local press freedom organizations expressed fears that this may have been related to his reporting.

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BURUNDI

• Radio and online journalist Etienne Ndikuriyo was jailed for nine days in June over a report that said the transitional president, Domitien Ndayizeye, was "depressed" by his party's election defeat. He was accused of "violating the honor and the privacy of the head of state" and released on bail.

• In July, the National Communications Council (CNC), an official media regulatory body, ordered Radio Publique Africaine (RPA) off the air indefinitely, alleging that RPA's recent election coverage was biased and that it had insulted the council. RPA Director Alexis Sinduhije called the suspension unjust and said the station intended to stay on the air despite the order.

• A week later, police shut down RPA, despite a compromise agreement with the CNC mediated by journalists' organizations. The station was allowed to reopen five days later. After the CNC chairman resigned, former president Domitien Ndayizeye replaced the council and included RPA's deputy director among its new members. The reopening of the station and the shakeup at the CNC followed a public outcry over the censorship attempt.

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CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC

• In May, three well-known journalists received death threats following critical coverage of the second round of national elections. CPJ sources said the threats were linked to reports carried by the independent radio station Radio Ndeke Luka and the independent daily newspaper Le Citoyen that armed forces had intimidated voters at polling stations. The journalists targeted were Zéphirin Kaya and Patrick Akibata of Radio Ndeke Luka; and Maka Gbossokotto, managing editor of Le Citoyen.

• President François Bozizé promulgated a law that decriminalized most press offenses, including defamation and "insult." But the law, which was welcomed by local journalists' groups, maintained criminal sanctions for offenses such as inciting criminal activities and provoking ethnic or religious hatred.

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COMOROS

• In January, authorities on the semi-autonomous island of Anjouan ordered the suspension of all news broadcasts on Radio Dzialandzé Mutsamudu (RDM), a popular, privately owned station that is a rare independent source of local and international news for the island's residents. The order stemmed from a recent RDM interview with a doctor who defended a strike by the island's medical personnel; government officials had previously criticized the strike. The suspension was lifted two weeks later.

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DJIBOUTI

• Officials cut off Radio France Internationale's FM broadcasts in January. RFI and French media said this was because of its reporting of an ongoing French legal inquiry into the 1995 death in Djibouti of Bernard Borrel, a French judge.

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EQUATORIAL GUINEA

• In June, police at the airport in the mainland city of Bata seized 200 copies of La Verdad, a publication run by the tiny opposition Convergence for Social Democracy party. The seizure was linked to the newspaper's often critical political coverage, according to a CPJ source. State-owned and government-friendly outlets dominate Equatorial Guinea's media; while a handful of private papers are licensed, they rarely publish and are subject to strict censorship by authorities. Although the constitution guarantees press freedom, criticism of the government in the local press is not tolerated.

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ERITREA

• According to CPJ's annual census of imprisoned journalists, 15 journalists remained in prison or otherwise deprived of their liberty, the victims of a ruthless crackdown on dissent in September 2001. The journalists had worked for local independent publications, all of which were shut down by the government at the same time. Journalists were jailed without charge and held largely incommunicado. There are no local private media in Eritrea.

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GABON

• In August, the National Communications Council (CNC), a government-controlled media regulatory body, suspended the independent bimonthly newspaper Nku'u Le Messager over an editorial it said insulted the council. The paper was allowed to reopen three weeks later, after it bowed to the CNC's instructions and reshuffled its editorial team.

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GHANA

• Frank Boahene, editor of the private weekly Free Press, was jailed for 15 days in July for contempt of court. The ruling stemmed from failure to appear in court over the paper's alleged refusal to comply with a November 2004 civil libel ruling.

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GUINEA

• In February, security forces arrested La Lance journalist Mohamed Lamine Diallo—known by his pen name, Benn Pépito—searched his home, and detained him for three days without charge. Pépito's arrest coincided with the publication of a critical editorial by the journalist in which he compared the situation in Guinea, where President Lansana Conté has ruled since 1984, to that of Togo, where the army moved to install longtime ruler Gnassingbé Eyadema's son as president following Eyadema's death.

• Conté signed a decree allowing private broadcasting in Guinea, one of the last countries in Africa, along with Zimbabwe and Eritrea, to have banned it. The law, signed in August, enables private citizens and organizations to broadcast but excludes political parties and religious movements. Local journalists welcomed the new law, but remained concerned that the government could delay its implementation or use red tape to block license applications.

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KENYA

• In January, journalist Kamau Ngotho of the independent daily The East African Standard was charged with criminal libel in a Nairobi court in connection with a story detailing alleged links between the government and big business. The government dropped the charges six days later, after Ngotho was granted a request to challenge them in the High Court on constitutional grounds.

• In April, Managing Editor David Makali of the Nairobi-based East African Standard's Sunday edition was acquitted of criminal charges stemming from a 2003 investigative article about the murder of a key player in Kenya's constitutional reform process. The article was based on leaked excerpts of confessions made by suspects in the murder, believed by some to have been a political assassination. In addition to ruling that the prosecution had not established its case against Makali, the judge said that to convict the editor would contravene constitutional guarantees.

• On the night of May 2, the eve of World Press Freedom Day, first lady Lucy Kibaki stormed into the offices of the independent daily The Nation with six bodyguards and the Nairobi police chief, to protest what she called unfair coverage of her family. She stayed for about five hours, insulting and threatening journalists and slapping a cameraman who filmed her, according to local and international news reports.

• In October, Anderson Ojwang', a correspondent for The East African Standard, was beaten by youths bearing whips and sticks. Ojwang' was trying to cover a government meeting in the western town of Kakamega that was called to raise support for a new draft constitution. The attack came after a government minister had asked the press to leave and accused journalists of giving negative coverage to those backing the draft constitution. The draft was rejected in a November referendum.

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LIBERIA

• A Monrovia court ordered the offices of the privately owned weekly Forum shuttered for "contempt of court" in March. The action came after the paper's managing editor allegedly missed several summonses in connection with an ongoing civil libel case. The paper reopened two weeks later, after paying a fine.

• In November, journalists complained of attacks and death threats made by supporters of failed presidential candidate George Weah. His party, the Congress for Democratic Change (CDC), claimed fraud in the presidential runoff won by Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. The Press Union of Liberia advised journalists not to cover functions at CDC headquarters in the capital, Monrovia, until the party could guarantee their safety. The union said it had documented five cases of CDC supporters beating journalists at the headquarters. It later lifted its advisory, saying CDC leadership had apologized and offered assurances about journalist security.

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MADAGASCAR

• In March and April, Lola Rasoamaharo, the publication director of the private daily La Gazette de la Grande Ile, was sentenced to four jail terms ranging from one to two months in connection with four separate criminal defamation charges. Gazette Editor James Ramarosaona was also given a one-month jail sentence in one of the cases. Both remained free pending an appeal.

• French journalist Olivier Péguy was forced to leave the country in May after the government refused to renew his work permit. The reasons for the nonrenewal were unclear, and some CPJ sources said it might have been linked to Péguy's reporting. Péguy had reported from Madagascar for four years for Radio France Internationale and other international news organizations.

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MALAWI

• In March, police arrested BBC reporter Raphael Tenthani and Mabvuto Banda of the independent daily The Nation after the journalists reported that President Bingu wa Mutharika had moved out of the presidential palace because of fears it was haunted. The journalists were detained overnight and charged with "publishing a false story likely to cause public fear." A charge of "causing ridicule to the high office of the President" was later added, AFP reported.

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MALI

• In July, unidentified assailants kidnapped and brutally beat Hamidou Diarra, a
commentator for independent Radio Kledu. Local journalists said they believed the assault was linked to Diarra's radio program, in which he frequently criticizes abuses of power by local politicians and others.

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MOZAMBIQUE

• A fugitive in the 2000 murder of investigative reporter Carlos Cardoso was returned to Mozambique in January. Anibal Antonio dos Santos Junior, better known as Anibalzinho, had fled custody in May 2004 after he was convicted of murder, along with five co-defendants, and sentenced to 28 years in prison. He was later captured in Canada, where authorities eventually agreed to return him to Mozambique. Anibalzinho was granted a retrial, which opened in December.

• In January, two men commandeered the car of Jeremias Langa, news director at the private television station STV, held guns to his head, and threatened to kill him. Before ejecting the journalist from the car, the assailants told Langa, "You're going to die like Carlos Cardoso," referring to the crusading investigative journalist who was murdered in 2000 for his aggressive coverage of a corruption scandal involving the state-controlled Commercial Bank of Mozambique.

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NIGER

• In March, authorities harassed journalists and sought to suppress media coverage of strikes and protests organized by a coalition of civil society organizations against a new tax on basic commodities in this impoverished country. The country's interior minister appeared on state television to warn journalists against covering the coalition's activities.

• By the end of March, five leaders of the Coalition Against Costly Living were behind bars, facing accusations of threatening state security after giving interviews on local radio stations criticizing the new tax. Police shuttered the offices of privately owned Radio Alternative for more than a week, possibly in connection with the detention of Moussa Tchangari, a leading member of the coalition who directs the station's parent company.

• Starting in late April, authorities sought to repress local coverage of a developing nationwide famine for fear that the news would tarnish the country's image, according to the Media Foundation for West Africa. In early August, President Mamadou Tandja publicly denied the existence of famine in Niger, despite widespread media reports and a vast international aid campaign.

• In September, a court in the northern town of Agadez convicted Abdoulaye Harouna, managing editor of the monthly Echos Express, of defaming the local governor, Yahaya Yendaka. He was sentenced to four months in jail and fined 520,000 CFA francs (US$950), but no arrest warrant was immediately issued to take him into custody. Harouna told CPJ that Yendaka filed a defamation suit against him after an article accused the governor of corruption in the distribution of food aid in the Agadez region during a nationwide food shortage.

• The director of a private weekly was arrested in November and placed in preventive detention after State Treasurer Siddo Elhadj filed a criminal defamation suit against him. Salifou Soumaila Abdoulkarim of Le Visionnaire was convicted in December and sentenced to two months in jail. Elhadj brought the lawsuit over an article in Le Visionnaire that accused him of embezzling 17 billion CFA francs (US$30 million) in government funds.

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NIGERIA

• In January, police at an executive meeting of the ruling People's Democratic Party in the capital, Abuja, assaulted at least 10 journalists covering the meeting. One reporter was hospitalized after being beaten unconscious. According to local news reports, police attacked the journalists with batons and gun butts when they moved forward to photograph Chris Ngige, the embattled governor of southern Anambra state.

• Also in January, State Security Service (SSS) agents in the southeastern city of Enugu raided newsstands selling the local tabloid Eastern Pilot, harassed vendors, and detained the local chairman of the Newspapers Vendors' Association. Local sources linked the SSS actions to reports in the Eastern Pilot about the separatist, ethnic Igbo Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra(MASSOB).

• On May 2, Omo-Ojo Orobosa, publisher of the weekly Midwest Herald, was imprisoned for more than two weeks after his paper accused first lady Stella Obasanjo of corruption. He was freed without charge.

• Police in central Kogi State occupied the local chapter of the Nigerian Union of Journalists in June, demanding to see two reporters who had written stories alleging that armed bandits had humiliated the local police commissioner. The officers harassed the local journalists and detained the local union chairman.

• Also in June, SSS agents arrested Haruna Acheneje, a correspondent for the independent daily The Punch in southern Akwa Ibom state, and held him for eight hours before releasing him without charge. Acheneje was pressured to reveal his sources for an article about the recently impeached deputy governor of Akwa Ibom, Chris Ekpeyong.

• In August, armed SSS agents raided the offices of the Lagos-based weekly The Exclusive, detained and harassed vendors, and seized copies of the newspaper following articles on Igbo secession movements, including MASSOB.

• In October, SSS agents arrested Owei Kobina Sikpi, publisher of the tabloid Weekly Star in the southern city of Port Harcourt, and jailed him for more than a month over an article that accused a local official of money laundering. The agents also confiscated the entire print run of the paper. Sikpi was eventually charged with several counts of publishing false information.

• The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), an official regulatory body, ordered the country's leading independent broadcast network off the air over its coverage of an October airplane crash in which all 117 passengers died. It accused Daar Communications group's African Independent Television and its radio network, RayPower FM, of violating journalistic ethics by reporting, among other things, that the crash left no survivors, before the government had officially confirmed the toll. The two media outlets complied with the order but were back on the air the same day following negotiations with the government. President Olusegun Obasanjo said he was shocked by the NBC's order, and that the media outlets should have been commended, rather than closed.

• In late November, security forces under the authority of the federal government stormed a radio station owned by the local government of southern Bayelsa state. The station was closed as federal authorities intensified their efforts to unseat the state governor, Diepreye Alamieyeseigha. Alamieyeseigha embarrassed Nigerian authorities after he jumped bail in London, where he was due to stand trial for alleged money laundering, and returned in disguise to his home district.

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SENEGAL

• A trial began in July for Madiambal Diagne, publication director of the independent daily Le Quotidien, on charges of threatening national security, publishing false news, and publishing secret government documents. The government has yet to repeal the controversial Article 80 of Senegal's penal code, under which Diagne was placed in "preventive detention" for two weeks in 2004, despite repeated promises to do so. The trial was ongoing at year's end.

• The same month, government officials warned journalists not to broadcast recordings of former Prime Minister Idrissa Seck, after Seck was imprisoned on national security and corruption charges. The police later summoned and questioned several local journalists with alleged ties to Seck, including veteran political commentator Abdou Latif Coulibaly. Jailing Seck, who was considered to be a political rival of President Abdoulaye Wade, called into question Wade's democratic credentials,according to local journalists and political analysts.

• In September, chief caliph Serigne Saliou Mbacké ordered three FM radio stations based in the Muslim holy city of Touba to leave the city within three days, saying he intended to "preserve the holy city from occult practices contrary to Islam." The commercial station Disso, the local branch of state-owned Radio Télévision Sénégalaise, and community radio station Hizbut Tarqiyah went off the air immediately. Local sources told CPJ that the expulsion could be linked to news and discussion programs broadcast by Disso, including a recent phone-in program in which several callers criticized Touba's elected governing council. Disso's director, Ibrahima Benjamin Diagne, told CPJ that local politicians influenced the caliph, who is a spiritual leader. While not legally binding, a ruling by the caliph carries great practical weight.

• In October, authorities closed the private radio station Sud FM and detained dozens of its staff following the broadcast of an interview with Salif Sadio, a radical member of the rebel movement in southern Casamance. Authorities also banned distribution of the October 17 edition of Sud-Quotidien, a newspaper from the same media group as the radio station, which published the text of the interview. Following a public outcry, the station was authorized to resume broadcasting late the same day and the staff members were released. Authorities maintained a ban on "the broadcast, rebroadcast, or publication of the incriminating interview by any media outlet." Local sources said some of the journalists who had been questioned could be criminally charged.

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SIERRA LEONE

• Olu Gordon, editor of the satirical newspaper The Peep, was detained for three days and threatened with criminal prosecution in February over an article criticizing President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah. Gordon was released without charge.

• In May, managing editor Sydney Pratt and reporter Dennis Jones of the private weekly The Trumpet were jailed for three days and charged with "seditious libel" over an article on high-level corruption. Both journalists were acquitted in June.

• In July, Harry Yansaneh, acting editor of the private newspaper For Di People, died following a May attack he had blamed on a ruling party MP, Fatmata Hassan. Under domestic and international pressure, the government ordered an inquest. In August, the inquest found that Yansaneh's death was accelerated by the attack, and it ordered the arrest of six people, including Hassan, for suspected manslaughter.

• Paul Kamara, editor and publisher of For Di People, was freed from prison in November after spending more than a year behind bars. An appellate court in the capital, Freetown, overturned his conviction on seditious libel charges, ruling that Kamara's actions did not constitute sedition. Kamara had been charged under the draconian 1965 Public Order Act after publishing articles critical of Kabbah. Local journalists have long struggled to have the Public Order Act repealed.

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SOUTH AFRICA

• In May, the Johannesburg High Court barred the independent weekly Mail and Guardian from publishing a follow-up story on alleged illegal diversion of public funds through the private South African oil company Imvume to the ruling African National Congress party. In June, the gag order was lifted when the paper and lawyers for Imvume chief Sandi Majali decided to settle out of court. The settlement was reached after the revelations were aired in Parliament and reported in the press. The original article later ran in the Mail and Guardian.

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TANZANIA

• In June, authorities on the semi-autonomous Tanzanian island of Zanzibar banned critical political columnist Jabir Idrissa from writing, accusing him of working without permission from the island authorities. Idrissa disputed the charges, citing his press accreditation from the mainland government. The ban was lifted later the same month, after the journalist applied for and was granted local accreditation.

• In September, a group of prison wardens and prisoners acting on their orders assaulted Mpoki Bukuku, chief photographer for the privately owned Sunday Citizen, as he attempted to cover the eviction of families from houses that were being repossessed by the Tanzanian Prisons Department. Christopher Kidanka, information officer for a local human rights organization, was also assaulted. After Home Affairs Minister Omar Ramadhan Mapuri defended the assault, saying that Prisons Department officers had used "reasonable" force in the evictions, local media organizations announced a ban on all coverage of the minister. He later apologized for his statements.

• Also in September, Tanzanian authorities banned HakiElimu, a local nongovernmental organization, from compiling or publishing reports on Tanzania's education system. The Ministry of Education and Culture accused the organization of "disparaging the image of our education system and the teaching profession of our country through [the] media," according to news reports and the local chapter of the Media Institute for Southern Africa. The ministry's action stemmed from a HakiElimu report issued in August that criticized government efforts to reform primary education, press reports stated.

• Amid preparations for delayed national elections, the government ordered two
local newspapers to temporarily cease publishing, accusing both of violating the 1976 Newspaper Act. The Swahili-language daily Tanzania Daima was suspended for three days for publishing a picture and caption deemed offensive to President Benjamin Mkapa. The newspaper is published by a media company associated with opposition presidential candidate Freeman Mbowe, according to news reports. The weekly tabloid Amani was suspended for 28 days for alleged ethical violations. According to the Media Institute of Southern Africa, the Newspaper Act gives the minister of information wide discretionary powers to suspend or close newspapers.

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UGANDA

• In June, a local official in the town of Soroti ordered David Enyaku, a journalist working for the government-owned New Vision, arrested when Enyaku tried to interview him about land allocation. Enyaku was detained for two nights and charged with "criminal trespassing."

• Authorities shut the independent radio station KFM for a week in August. The action came after the station aired a talk show hosted by veteran journalist Andrew Mwenda, focusing on the July helicopter crash that killed southern Sudanese leader John Garang. President Yoweri Museveni said the government would shut down any news outlet that "plays around with regional security."

• The day after authorities shuttered KFM, police arrested Mwenda and charged him with sedition. The charge stemmed from a KFM program in which Mwenda criticized Museveni and suggested that Ugandan government incompetence was responsible for the helicopter crash that killed Garang. Mwenda was released on bail after three days in detention, but he faces five years in jail and a fine if convicted. In November, the government brought 13 additional charges against him, including sedition and "promoting sectarianism."

• In November, the government threatened to close The Monitor, Uganda's leading independent daily, over a story about President Yoweri Museveni's choice for army chief. The newspaper's managing director, Conrad Nkutu, told CPJ that authorities also pressured the paper's management to fire Mwenda, who wrote the article.

• Also in November, the government ordered local journalists not to discuss or comment on the scheduled trial of jailed opposition leader Kizza Besigye on charges of treason, terrorism, and rape. Troops barred journalists from attending a court hearing in the case.

• The same month, police entered The Monitor as the paper was printing an issue that carried a paid advertisement soliciting contributions for "The Kizza Besigye Human Rights Fund." They harassed staff, saying the advertisement was illegal. Police also stopped the newspaper's delivery vans at several roadblocks and confiscated the paper in at least two towns.

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ZAMBIA

• In June, supporters of the ruling party, armed with machetes, attacked newspaper vendors selling the independent daily The Post. Local sources reported that the attacks were carried out in retribution for The Post's criticism of President Levy Mwanawasa for allegedly shielding a Health Ministry official from prosecution for corruption.

• Police threatened to charge radio commentator Anthony Mukwita with sedition after a June 10 broadcast on the privately owned Radio Phoenix in which he read an anonymous fax criticizing Mwanawasa's administration for allegedly failing to crack down on corruption. Following the broadcast, Radio Phoenix management terminated Mukwita's contract, an action Mukwita believes was prompted by threats from Zambian authorities.

• In late June, police questioned Fred M'membe, editor-in-chief of The Post and a former CPJ International Press Freedom Award recipient, and threatened to charge him with defaming the president. The Post had published a series of editorials accusing Mwanawasa of being a "liar" for allegedly failing to tackle official corruption.

• The Post's M'membe was charged with criminal defamation in November. The charge stemmed from a commentary he wrote in which he accused Mwanawasa of hypocrisy, stupidity, and a "lack of humility." The commentary followed a bitter attack by Mwanawasa on former president Kenneth Kaunda, who had advocated wider consultation on a controversial draft constitution.

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