Silence reigned supreme in Eritrea, where the entire independent press was under a government ban and 11 journalists languished in jail at year’s end. Clamorous, deadly power struggles raged in Zimbabwe over land and access to information, and in Burundi over ethnicity and control of state resources. South Africa, Senegal, and Benin remained relatively liberal…
The so-called failed state syndrome hampered efforts to reunite Somalia, wracked by inter-clan warfare since 1991. Although the year began with news that the economy was slowly recovering, it ended with a bleak United Nations assessment that Somalia was on the brink of an economic collapse unmatched in its modern history.
PRESS COVERAGE OF ARMED CONFLICTS CONTINUED TO STIR THE HOSTILITY of governments and rebel factions alike and claim reporters’ lives, but the prominent role of the press in the often-volatile process of democratization also brought unprecedented challenges to journalists working in Africa. CPJ confirmed that in 2000, five journalists were killed specifically because of their…
WITH NO FUNCTIONING CENTRAL GOVERNMENT IN RECENT YEARS, Somalia remains fractured into rival fiefdoms controlled by warlords. Threats to local journalists have been correspondingly decentralized. In the last months of 2000, however, newly-elected president Abdiqasim Salad Hassan and a new transitional legislature tried with some success to assert central authority. (Both Hassan and the legislature…
Ever since political rivals ousted President Mohammed Siad Barre in 1991, clan warfare has left Somalia without a central government. The country’s media consists largely of small newsletters and faction-run radio stations, and independent journal-ism is virtually nonexistent in most parts of the country. Somalia is largely fractured into warring fiefdoms controlled by warlords. This…
Washington, D.C., March 25 — The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported today in its annual worldwide study of press freedom that at least 118 journalists were in prison in 25 countries at the end of 1998, and 24 journalists in 17 countries were murdered during the year in reprisal for their reporting.
Independent Nigerian journalist Nosa Igiebor has been languishing in prison since his arrest in December 1995. He was jailed for his critical coverage of the country’s military dictator, Gen. Sani Abacha. Though he was placed in solitary confinement, Igiebor was hardly alone. In fact, a record 182 journalists around the world were in jail at…
CPJ’s 1995 report surveys 101 countries The bullet-ridden wall pictured on the cover is a detail from a photograph taken in Somalia by American photojournalist Dan Eldon of Reuters. Eldon, Associated Press photojournalist Hansi Krauss, and Reuter colleagues Hosea Maina and Anthony Macharia were murdered in July 1993 by a Somali crowd angered by the…