January 21 marks Press Day in Somalia, the most dangerous country in Africa to be a journalist. As such, few local journalists
find much reason to celebrate. With nine Somali journalists killed
in the line of duty last year, numerous local journalists have fled, especially
from the restive capital, Mogadishu.
“The free media is going to die out,”
journalist Mustafa Haji Abdinur warned Ron Hill in an MSNBC interview
last year after he received CPJ’s
2009 International Press Freedom Award.

Abdinur,
an Agence France-Presse correspondent and editor-in-chief of local radio
station Radio
Simba, was the first Somali journalist to win our award. His courage and
determination to continue reporting in a country that Oxfam has called “the
worst humanitarian situation in Africa in many
years,” made him an excellent choice.
After
flying to New York City
to receive his CPJ award, Abdinur did something that surprised most of his
colleagues: He returned home. “For many people here, they thought returning from
America to Mogadishu at this time was like preferring death than life,” he told
me recently, “but they still appreciate my decision to work in my restive
capital with the risks at hand.”
Abdinur
launched a new initiative this week—the Somali
Media for Peace and Development. Since 2003, Abdinur has been planning on a
peace initiative using the media to help end the violence he has experienced
his entire life. “I did a lot of research on this idea and was surprised to see
that no peace initiatives actively involved the media,” said Abdinur, who is
continuing his AFP and Radio Simba work as well. “To me, a peace initiative
without involving the media is like tea without sugar.”
Although
diminishing in numbers, independent journalists still play an influential role with
the population. “People are now accustomed to getting information through the
local media. We hope to influence the attitudes
and behavior of conflict-affected communities across Somalia to seek non-violent
solutions through the media—and to empower the media to follow suit.”
Considering
all the dangers journalists face in Somalia, why begin a new initiative
now? “I can simply say nothing is safe in Somalia at this time,” Abdinur told
me. “If you stay in your house and speak to nobody without doing anything, you
will find someone who is not pleased with your existence—so, in this culture, we
need to push for peace more than ever.”