Hitting messenger: would Africa pass test on free press

In Uganda, the state covertly intimidate and influence dismissal from duty of journalists thought to be ‘critical’ to government

Alon Mwesigwa in Kampala

Taylor Krauss, an American journalist and freelance filmmaker was last July deported from Uganda after spending three days in detention. His crime was that he was found filming Dr Kiiza Besigye, the main opposition figure to president Museveni. Government says he had entered the country without journalist accreditation.

Krauss’ equipment was taken, footage deleted, and he was interrogated for several hours by the Uganda Police in Kampala.

Krauss is just one of tens of hundreds of journalists that face attacks on the continent. A report released on Tuesday on the press freedoms in Uganda, showed that 124 violations targeting journalists were recorded last year. Eighty five of these were by the Uganda Police.

Titled Narrowing space; media under attack, by the Human Rights Network for Journalist Uganda (HRNJ-U) and Open Society Initiative for Eastern Africa (OSIEA), the report says the media in Uganda faced the toughest year in 2013 as reports of attacks increased, with two journalists being killed under unclear circumstances.

“The deaths reveal the extreme dangers faced by journalists in the execution of their work. The risk is higher with journalists who work during odd hours of the night, particularly female journalists,” said the report, which interviewed victims, witnesses, and alleged perpetrators.  

“Police employed various tactics like detention without trial, roughing up journalists, barring them from accessing news scenes, and deliberately tear gassing them,” says the report.

The report says government officials influencing dismissal of reporters. Some journalists in Uganda lost their jobs after they hosted opposition figures, the government regarded as ‘dangerous’ and were inciting the violence.     

Last year, the report says, two laws inimical to free press were passed. The Uganda Communications Act 2013 and the Pubic Order Management Act 2013. The former empowers the minister of Information to give directive to the communications commission to investigate journalists and media houses thought to go against their guidelines.

The latter provides that a journalist would be arrested if found covering a gathering of more than three people without police permission. 

Uganda’s Daily monitor and Red pepper newspapers were closed for ten days after they published a leaked letter that said Museveni was grooming his son to succeed him.  

The UN Special Rapporteur to Uganda Margaret Ssekagya said: “The report highlights a worrying trend by revealing the perpetrators. The courts must adjudicate and ensure the rights of journalists aren’t violated.”

Yet Uganda is not alone.

In the East African region, reports of media coming under attack have come to the fore. After the September Westgate Mall terrorist attacks in Kenya, Police Inspector-General David Kimaiyo threatened to arrest journalists John Allan Namu and Mohammed Ali of KTN television after they aired a story that raised questions over the conduct and coordination of security forces at the time of the attack.

Kimaiyo said the journalists intended to incite the public against government.

Last December, Kenya parliament passed two laws thought to be targeting the media. Journalists went to court and on January 31, a Nairobi-based court halted implementation of the Media Council Act 2013 and Kenya Information and Communications (Amendment) Act 2013 until the court considers the legal questions therein.

The media in Kenya says the laws violate Article 34 of Kenya’s constitution, which guarantees the media sector protection from government influence.  

In Tanzania, the situation is not any better.

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) last August reported that some journalists have been attacked while critical media was being shut down.

In July 2012, CPJ says, the Tanzania’s Information Ministry indefinitely suspended the leading critical weekly, MwanaHalisi; its editor Saed Kubenea said the government-ordered shutdown emanated from the paper’s in-depth coverage of a 2012 physicians’ strike.

In Rwanda, journalists have been exiled to Uganda and other countries while others have been imprisoned for allegedly defaming President Paul Kagame.

Elsewhere on the continent, Aljazeera journalists, a BBC correspondent, and Dutch newspaper and radio journalist among others are under-going trial in Egypt for allegedly spreading false news and supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, which was designated a terrorist organisation. The trial has instigated would outcry over flinching press freedom on the continent.

In Somalia, CPJ says in 2012 alone twelve journalists were killed while on duty. In the capital Mogadishu, four journalists were dead in a 24-hour period in September 2012. The statistic makes Somalia one of the worst places for journalists on the continent.

CPJ has also listed Eritrea, Ethiopia and Egypt as having the biggest number of imprisoned journalists in Africa.

"I think they have been on this list year-in, year-out simply because of the governments' lack of tolerance towards any kind criticism. Every time a reporter reports something critically, they throw them in jail," Tom Rhodes, CPJ’s Nairobi-based east Africa representative, told Voice of America recently.

In Libya, journalists are expected to keep tight-lipped over the excesses of government. Several journalists have reportedly been physically assaulted with government showing less effort to protect them.