Africa
2009
Chad expels Cameroonian journalist after Nobel story
New York, October 16, 2009—Chadian authorities summarily expelled a Cameroonian-born journalist from the country on Wednesday, a day after he wrote an op-ed in response to a government official’s suggestion that the Nobel Peace Prize should have been awarded to Chad President Idriss Deby.
Veteran Zambian editor charged with contempt over op-ed
New York, October 15, 2009—The editor-in-chief of Zambia’s largest newspaper was criminally charged for the second time on Wednesday after running an op-ed critical of controversial pornography charges against a journalist, according to local journalists and news reports.
Q&A: Wife enters journalism after husband’s murder
The killers of Nigerian Editor Bayo Ohu are still a mystery, three weeks after his murder. Now the family of the former Guardian newspaper journalist lives in fear. Ohu was shot dead early on Sunday morning, September 20, by a gang of five armed men and a woman in his apartment in Egbeda, a Lagos…
Congolese journalists protest insecurity, threats
Reporter Jolly Kamuntu is more than eight months pregnant, but she joined hundreds of Congolese journalists today in nationwide protest marches against insecurity and threats. Kamuntu, who is based in Bukavu, where three reporters have been murdered since 2007, was cited recently in an anonymous text message threatening to kill her and two other local…
Journalist killed on a Sunday morning at home in Nigeria
More than two weeks have passed since the cold-blooded killing of Bayo Ohu, assistant news editor and political reporter for the Lagos, Nigeria-based The Guardian. The 45-year-old, soft-spoken workaholic opened the door to his home early on Sunday, September 20, as he prepared for church. According to eyewitnesses and local reports, five gunmen and one female ringleader shot Ohu…
Gabon’s bloggers struggle to take hold
It’s been a couple of weeks since I left Gabon, and a month since elections to pick a successor to Omar Bongo, who ruled Africa’s fourth-largest oil producer for 41 years. There are unresolved questions about the ballot count and the number of people killed in post-election violence.
Government suspends VOA service in Puntland
New York, October 2, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the suspension on Thursday of three Voice of America (VOA) reporters in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland in northeastern Somalia. Puntland’s Deputy Minister of Information Abdishakur Mire Adan issued a letter suspending all three VOA correspondents and any other VOA journalist from reporting in the…
A journalist in the hands of Somali pirates
Shadows of emerging skyscrapers in a neighborhood in Nairobi come alive as the sun glides down the western horizon. I am walking down one of the deserted streets in the city’s Eastleigh shantytown. Lately, Eastleigh has become a contradiction of sorts. While the roads remain as torn as ever and clean drinking water and other…
Nigerien editor charged with criminal libel
New York, September 24, 2009—A newspaper editor in police custody in Niger since Sunday was charged with criminal libel on Wednesday in connection with a story accusing a top official of involvement in a corruption scandal, according to local journalists and news reports.
CPJ urges Senegal to decriminalize press offenses
Dear Mr. President: The Committee to Protect Journalists is heartened by your recent directive to the prime minister to renew consultations with the press on the decriminalization of press offenses in Senegal. Yet your directive came on the same day a judge in the central town of Kaolack imprisoned two journalists who reported allegations of local government corruption in the distribution of seeds—a reminder of the urgent need for press law reform.