Reporters Without Borders is appalled that an enquiry ordered by the president into a journalist’s death in prison last April has come to exactly the same conclusions as to the cause of death as the explanation originally offered by the authorities. The findings of the investigation into the death of Cameroun Express editor Ngota Ngota Germain (aka Bibi Ngota) in Yaoundé’s Kondengui prison on 22 April were presented to a meeting of journalists on 14 September by justice minister and deputy prime minister Amadou Ali.

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Google is trying to expand the number of Internet users in Africa and make the Web more relevant to local businesses by organizing events and reaching out to engage students in key sub-Saharan countries in projects that focus on website optimization, maps for business and online advertising.[more]

Nairobi — For all East Africans, the memories of this year's soccer World Cup will forever be blighted by the bombings in Kampala during the July 11 final. Innocent people out to enjoy the football lost their lives, others were injured and property destroyed. East Africans therefore supported and sympathised with the government of Uganda's determination to find and hold to account those responsible.

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The global advocacy group has received almost 30,000 signatures for an online petition against the ANC's proposed Media Appeals Tribunal, The Times newspaper reported on Wednesday. Avaaz spokesman Alice Jay said 29,347 people had signed up by Tuesday afternoon.

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Two photojournalists working with different media houses in Uganda were confronted and beaten up while on duty at two different entertainment spots in Kampala on 22 September 2010. Stuart Yiga, 26, a reporter and photojournalist with the "Red Pepper" publication, was beaten up by a city lawyer, Geoffrey Kayanja, who smashed his camera and accused him of taking photos of him at a graduation party held at Club T1, located along 2nd street, an industrial area in Kampala.

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The National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ) is alarmed over the arrest by Al-Shabaab militants of a journalist in Beledhawo town, Gedo region, in southwestern Somalia, on 26 September 2010.

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Moussa Aksar, publisher of privately-owned “L’Evenement” newspaper was on September 20, 2010 arrested and detained overnight by security personnel drawn from Niger’s intelligence service, Renseignements Généraux (RG), for allegedly criticizing the country’s security agents. [more]

EVEN dead, they would get me, the man from Mugabe's spy agency, the CIO, had warned. My corpse would be shred into "mince meat" even if I returned to Zimbabwe in a coffin for burial, he told me when our paths crossed in Johannesburg. I had been branded a "sell out", and an enemy of the state for my reports in the foreign media on how the ruling party and its supporters waged their land war against white farmers and then tortured and murdered hundreds of black opposition supporters.

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In anticipation of Right to Know Day, 28 September 2010, ARTICLE 19 today launches the Global RTI Index, a new tool to compare and contrast right to information laws, highlighting weaknesses and best practices.

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The management and staff of Freetown-based Radio Democracy are living in a state fear after receiving frequent threats from some unknown persons. Radio Democracy has been off air for the past three months after being evicted from their premises by a court order, following their inability to pay their rent which was outrageously increased by the landlady from US$2,500 to US$2,500-$10,000 per annum.

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David Avocètien, a cameraman of privately-owned Chaine 2 television, was on September 23, 2010 heckled by Epihame Quenum, a member of Benin’s National Assembly. Avocètien’s camera was returned to him after he had agreed to delete a picture of Quenum.

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President Jammeh bags 4 awards," trumpeted a September 17 headline of the Daily Observer, a pro-government newspaper in the Gambia, a West African nation whose idyllic façade as "the smiling coast of Africa" is maintained in part by President Yahyah Jammeh's brutal repression of the independent press.[more]

On International Right to Know Day today (28 September) African democracy institute Idasa calls on countries that have taken bold steps of enacting access to information laws, such as Uganda, Angola and South Africa, to not regress into secrecy, but further strengthen implementation of these laws.[more]

While South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) discusses the party's proposal for a media appeals tribunal, delegates should take note of a landmark ruling in Nigeria this year in which a High Court judge declared a government-dominated press council unconstitutional. [more]

The banning of SMS messaging in Mozambique is but one of several signs that both SMS and the Internet are changing the way media creates a national conversation in African countries. Governments can police SMS and the Internet by closing it down but this is a “nuclear” option that cannot be kept in place (except in Ethiopia) for any length of time. Mobile companies are not used to thinking of themselves as media operators and are vulnerable to having their businesses squeezed by Government if they prove unco-operative. Russell Southwood looks at this emerging brave new world.[more]

The Sudanese authorities should halt the harassment and intimidation of journalists in the run up to the Referendum on southern independence in January 2011, Amnesty International said in a new briefing released today. The Chains Remain: Restrictions on Freedom of Expression in Sudan documents a clampdown on freedom of expression in Sudan since the April 2010 elections that has seen journalists regularly detained for carrying out their work while others have been tortured or tried on politically motivated charges.

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Veteran journalist, Tim Nyahunzvi, a trustee of MISA-Zimbabwe and accomplished media trainer, will be buried at Warren Hills Cemetery on Saturday, 25 September 2010. A funeral service will be held at 4pm today, 24 September 2010 at Nyaradzo Funeral Parlour along Herbert Chitepo Avenue in Harare. Thereafter, his body will be taken to number 13 Mukarati Road, Mufakose, where it will lie in state for the night vigil.

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Harare magistrate Olivia Mariga on 23 September 2010, issued out a warrant of arrest against Harare Mayor Muchadeyi Masunda after he failed to appear in court. Masunda was expected in court in connection with the case in which he and eight councillors’ stand accused of criminally defaming businessman Philip Chiyangwa.

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The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today condemned the measures by Algerian authorities against two Moroccan journalists who have been denied, without good reason, permission to leave their hotel in Tindouf since Saturday 18 September. The IFJ backs its Moroccan affiliate, the Syndicat national de la presse marocaine (SNPM) which has demanded the lifting of the movement restrictions and the end of interrogations of the journalists by officials in Tindouf.[more]

Washington, DC — In the wake of the killing of two journalists and concerns over a proposed amendment to the press law, the International Joint Partnership Freedom of Expression mission to Uganda today released findings and recommendations from a four-day mission to Kampala to address the deteriorating environment for freedom of expression.[more]

A photojournalist working for Red Pepper publications, Tony Kizito, fears for the lives of his family members following numerous direct threats from the District Resident Commissioners (RDCs) in Mukono and Buikwe, in the central region of Uganda. The RDCs are the president's representatives in a given district and perform duties on behalf of the president. They are public servants.

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As the leaders of the ruling African National Congress meet this week in the eastern city of Durban, Reporters Without Borders urges the South African government to abandon two proposed media laws, one to create a media tribunal and one to protect information involving "national security."[more]

The disruption of the Constitutional Parliamentary Committee’s outreach consultative meetings in Harare, which vindicated concerns by civil society over the credibility of Zimbabwe’s constitutional reforms, was the focal point of the media’s coverage of the controversial consultative outreach programme.[more]

Alexander Afriyea, a correspondent of Kumasi-based Nhyira FM radio station, was in the morning of September 8, 2010 hospitalized after being violently attacked by persons believed to be supporters of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) party in Effiduase, the capital of Sekyere East District of Ashanti Region. [more]

A group of angry prison officers in Kumasi, Ghana’s second largest city, on September 16, 2010 besieged the premises of privately-owned OTEC FM and attacked two staff members, including the programmes manager, Kate Frema Adomako.[more]

ARTICLE 19 calls on the government of Somalia to amend the media law based on proposals by the National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ) and recommendations made by ARTICLE 19 in a legal analysis released today.[more]

This Comment outlines ARTICLE 19’s key concerns with the Drat Amendments aiming to reform the problematic Media Law of Somalia (“Media Law”).1 Adopted in December 2007, the Media Law has a number of problematic provision and subjects all media to a largely government controlled regulatory regime. For this reason, the Media Law was criticised by media freedom activities, including ARTICLE 19, that called on the authorities to revise the Law to bring it into line with international standards.

In August, ARTICLE 19 was informed that the Ministry of Information of Somalia and the National Union of Somali Journalists (“NUSOJ)” have undertaken an initiative to reform the

Media Law of Somalia. A Draft Amendment was produced as a result of two consultative meetings of representatives of the NUSOJ with the International Federation of Journalists, Reporters Sans Frontiers and the UN Human Rights Committee. ARTICLE 19 was requested to provide its/a view of the latter proposals for new provisions to be included in the Draft Amendment.[more]

Following his notice to sue a number of newspapers early this year, the Botswana-based Chief of the Bakgatla tribe, Kgosi Kgafela, has withdrawn the lawsuits in an out of court settlement, which has since been made an order of the court. This is according to Mmegi, one of the newspapers which were sued.[more]

We, the members of the West Africa Media Network for MDGs believe that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are the least economic indicators to tackling poverty in its various dimensions income poverty, disease, lack of adequate shelter, and exclusion - while promoting gender equality, environmental sustainability and education; We acknowledge and commend Heads-of-States for their commitments towards economic growth, sustainable development, peace and the MDGs in their respective countries; [more]

Reporters Without Borders roundly condemns yesterday’s assaults by Islamist militias on two radio stations in Mogadishu. Radio HornAfrik was ransacked and looted by members of Al-Shabaab while Global Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) was taken over by Hizb-Al-Islam, which has decided to use it for broadcasting its own propaganda.[more]

The Eritrean authorities continue to gag all forms of free expression and recently arrested another journalist as he was trying to flee the country, Reporters Without Borders said today, on the eve of the ninth anniversary of the start of a brutal political purge in Asmara on 18 September 2001. The organisation wrote to the British authorities yesterday urging them to prosecute one of the purge’s organisers, who now lives in Britain.[more]

Twenty-nine members of the International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX), a worldwide coalition of press freedom groups, yesterday voiced their support for the open letter which fellow IFEX members Reporters Without Borders and Journalist in Danger (JED), its partner organisation in the Democratic Republic of Congo, sent to President Joseph Kabila on 30 August.[more]

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today vehemently condemned the brutal murder of Prime Radio anchorman, Dickson Ssentongo, who was severely beaten by unknown assailants and abandoned to die in a cassava plantation in Mukono District some 35 km from the capital Kampala on Monday, 13 September, 2010.[more]

ARTICLE 19 calls on the government of Somalia to amend the media law based on proposals by the National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ) and recommendations made by ARTICLE 19 in a legal analysis released today.[more]

A Strike by Air Zimbabwe pilots, which resulted in the cancellation of most of the airline’s international flights, leaving thousands of travellers stranded, made headlines in all the media this week.[more]

The digital transition is not simply a technical changeover but an opportunity to provide better broadcasting for Africa’s citizens. The best of the continent’s telecoms policy-makers and regulators have been innovative in how they have tackled the issues they have faced. But in an area like broadcasting that is closer to the “powers that be” and potentially more threatening, there has been little sign of much needed innovation. Russell Southwood thinks the time has come to re-examine how public broadcasting works (or perhaps more accurately, doesn’t work) in Africa. Public broadcasting in Africa had a poor start in life. The colonial administrations who set up radio stations often exerted a strong control over their media so for newly-independent Governments, the former colonialists were in a poor position to be giving lectures about public purposes: the views expressed on the colonial radio stations reflected those of the administration and sometimes settlers in the country in question. [more]

In August, Shabelle Media Network, one of Somalia's leading independent broadcasters, did something incredibly brave--they rebroadcast news and music that the BBC's Somali-language service beams to the war-torn Horn of African nation in defiance of a ban imposed by hard-line militant Islamist rebel groups Al-Shabaab and Hizbul Islam. For Somali journalists, who risk death by crossfire and assassination, and censorship from both insurgents and the weak U.S.-backed transitional government, it was a courageous pushback against forces hostile to independent media.[more]

Reporters Without Borders is deeply shocked and saddened to learn that Dickson Ssentongo, a news presenter on Prime Radio, a Seventh Day Adventist station in the southeastern district of Mukono, was beaten to death by unidentified assailants using metal bars as he walked to work on 13 September.[more]

Reporters Without Borders deplores journalist Paul Kiggundu’s murder by a crowd of angry motorcyclists in the southern town of Rakai on 10 September. The correspondent of Top Radio and several TV stations, he was beaten to death when spotted filming their attack on a suspect’s home.[more]

Last week Google held a very well attended G-Kenya event for developers. But this has been just one of several things that have been happening on the continent that show a renewed focus on services and apps development. There is fertile ground for African tech innovators but they need to decide what prize they will be seeking, writes Russell Southwood. For a moment, it seemed like there would be lots of bandwidth (both national and international) and crashing prices but not much local content, services or apps to use on it. But below the radar, there have been a number of developments that saw the light of day over the last month that show Africa’s tech entrepreneurs are gearing up to fill this gap.[more]

Reporters Without Borders hails the conditional release on 8 September of the 10 Radio Fahazavana employees who have been in pre-trial detention since 27 May, even if they still have to face trial on a charge of inciting a revolt, but condemns a government decision to suspend the broadcasts of another radio station, Radio Mahafaly, until further notice.[more]

Reporters Without Borders is shocked by the death of Alberto Chakusanga, the host of a programme on a radio station critical of the government. The first journalist to be murdered in Angola since 2001, he was found dead in the kitchen of his home in the Luanda district of Viana at dawn on 5 September.[more]

Reporters Without Borders is relieved to learn that Jullson Eninga, the editor of the daily Le Journal, was released yesterday, one day after the Kinshasa/Kalamu high court acquitted him of treason on the grounds that neither the facts of the case nor the legality of the charge had been established.[more]

The Banjul Magistrate court presided over by Hilary Abeke on September 6, 2010 suspended indefinitely, a human rights NGO, Africa in Democracy and Good Governance (ADG) from operating in the country and sentenced its Nigerian Director of Programmes, Edwin Nebolisa Kwakaeme, to a mandatory six-month prison term with hard labour for giving false information to the office of President Yahya Jammeh. [more]

The visit by international music icons – US-based R&B singer Akon and his Jamaican Ragga counterpart, Sean Paul – as part of government efforts to rebrand the country’s battered image , hogged media limelight at the end of the week. But it was the crisis-ridden Constitutional Parliamentary Committee (Copac)’s consultation programme, bedevilled by funding and operational problems, which still received most publicity in both the government and private media during the week.[more]

On 7 September 2010, the Zambian government said it was awaiting a response from the Media Liaison Committee (MLC) concerning its proposal for Zambian media to be regulated under a statutory framework.[more]

Political crises and violent conflicts in West Africa created the conditions for abuse of media rights in 2009, says a new report by the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA).[more]

Luanda — The journalist of the private Luanda Antena Commercial (LAC) radio station, José Rodrigues, won the 2010 Journalism Maboque Prize.[more]

The United Nations-sponsored radio station based in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which has the largest Francophone audience in sub-Saharan Africa, is the winner of this year's Free Media Pioneer award bestowed by the International Press Institute (IPI), it was announced today.[more]

Luanda — The Ministry of Social Communication (MCS) Monday in Luanda repudiated the stand adopted by "Rádio Despertar" of inciting the population to rebel against the legally established and democratically elected institutions of the State.[more]

Luanda — Journalists have been called to work with experts from various areas for the retrieval of ethical and moral values, in order to decrease anti-social practices,ANGOP has learnt.[more]

Luanda — The senior journalist of the weekly "O Pais", Luís Fernando, Wednesday in Luanda spoke of the need for the Angolan media professionals to engage in the correct use of Portuguese language, as a fundamental tool in the job.[more]

Sumbe — Journalists in the central Kwanza-Sul Province will continue benefiting from technical professional training, to meet the demands in the sector, ANGOP has learnt.[more]

Freetown — In what is one of the most shocking things to happen to a journalist here in recent times, the Sierra Leone Association of Journalists is consternated by the reported detention by Magistrate MAB Shyllon of journalist Arthwah Maddie of For Di People newspaper.[more]

Luanda — The deputy minister of Social Communication, Manuel Miguel de Carvalho "Wadijimbi", Thursday in Luanda, said that diversification of media organs in the country helps improve the quality of journalism, Angop learnt.[more]

A radio journalist with private own Radio Despertar, a station critical of the ruling MPLA government, Alberto Graves Chakussanga, was gunned down at his house in Luanda on 5 September 2010. Chakussanga’s neighbors and relatives found the journalist lying in the kitchen of his house located in Luanda’s Viana District with a bullet wound in his back.

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This week's deadly unrest in Mozambique became a global news story in part because reporters and citizen journalists used new media and social networking tools. Clashes between security forces and people protesting rising prices in the capital, Maputo, left at least seven people dead and more than 200 people injured, according to the latest news reports. [more]

The Uganda Police Criminal Investigation Department (CID) grilled journalist Richard Mivule for over 5 hours over incitement to violence.[more]

The National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ) condemns, in the strongest terms possible, the continued and illegal detention, incommunicado, of a Somali online reporter in the commercial port town of Bossasso by the Puntland Intelligence Service (PIS).[more]

Following Sunday’s murder in Angola of Alberto Graves Chakussanga, a radio journalist with a station critical of the ruling MPLA government, authorities must conduct a thorough and transparent investigation exploring all possible leads and bring those responsible to justice, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.[more]

In a letter to the President, IFEX members and four other organisations called on the government to withdraw the proposed amendment and revise other existing laws related to free expression:

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The editor-in-chief of Defender, a weekly Amharic newspaper, Abraham Kifle, and his manager Ermias Asfaw today claimed they were interrogated by the police following alleged accusations by a cabinet minister.

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Luanda — The Association of Angolan Journalists (UJA) on Monday here called on the class to be engaged more and more in the national activities of retrieving moral and civic values taking place in the country, ANGOP has learnt.[more]

Luanda — The winners of the 2010 edition of the Maboque Journalism Prize will be announced Wednesday in Luanda, during a ceremony involving a cultural activity.[more]

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today condemned the unwarranted assault of New Vision Photographer, Arthur Kintu, by a businessman and prominent religious leader, Hassan Basajjabalaba which occurred on September, 6th at Namboole while he was covering the elections in Kampala, Uganda.[more]

Two resident district commissioners (RDC) arrested Red Pepper Publications Ltd. photojournalist Tony Kizito over the alleged publication of a defamatory story by "Kamunye" newspaper, a vernacular sister paper of Red Pepper.[more]

President Faure Essozimna Gnassingbé of Togo has filed another suit against Lomé-based privately-owned La lantern newspaper over an August 12, 2010 publication that he has claimed were false and insulting to his reputation.[more]

On the 1st of September 2010, an attempt was made to subvert a people’s right to receive and impart information as prescribed by the Universal Declaration of human Rights to which Zimbabwe is a signatory. This outdated authoritarian act was deliberately done to starve the people of Zimbabwe of diverging and objective news and views through jamming the SW Radio Africa.[more]

Danesious Marteh, a sports' reporter with privately-owned Frontpage Africa newspaper was on September 2, 2010 assaulted by three foreign-based players of the national soccer team for photographing them.[more]

Journalists worldwide face grave dangers when they expose societal ills and injustice. Currently, there are 454 journalists in exile and 26 have been killed already this year. The United Nations and other organizations are taking action to protect the rights of journalists whose lives are threatened as their mighty pens battle mighty swords.[more]

The Media Institute of Southern Africa, MISA Namibia, yesterday (31 August 2010) elected a new National Governing Council at the organisations 10th Annual General Meeting held in Windhoek. [more]

The Malawi Chapter of the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA-Malawi) has noted with disappointment that there is lack of respect for media freedom and freedom of expression in the country. The media in Malawi continue to be threatened by government authorities and other sectors of society, including some members of the public.[more]

While all media paid attention to the death of MDC-M Deputy President and former trade unionist, Gibson Sibanda, only the private media publicized the ensuing debate on the controversial criteria used to select national heroes in the country. The logistical and administrative obstacles bedevilling the Constitutional Parliamentary Committee (Copac)’s outreach consultative programme amid an appeal by the committee for more money to fund an extension of the exercise attracted significant media interest too.[more]

MISA-Zimbabwe condemns the recent government ban on any films and Bulawayo-based artiste Owen Maseko’s exhibition depicting Gukurahundi disturbances that took place after independence. [more]

The “SOS: Support Public Broadcasting” Campaign representing a number of trade unions including COSATU, COSATU affiliates CWU and CWUSA, FEDUSA and BEMAWU; independent film and TV production sector organisations including the South African Screen Federation (SASFED); and a host of NGOs and CBOs including the Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI), Media Monitoring Africa (MMA), the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA-SA) and the National Community Radio Forum (NCRF); as well as a number of academics and freedom of expression activists welcome the SABC Board’s decision to suspend the SABC’s CEO, Solly Mokoetle.[more]

The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) Group Chief Executive Officer, Solly Mokoetle, has been suspended. On 27 August 2010 the broadcasters’ board took a decision to suspend Mokoetle following a disastrous leadership to the beleaguered public broadcaster.[more]

Cape Town — The government is prepared to entertain changes to the controversial Protection of Information Bill but has warned that this can be done only as far as "is practicable and reasonable".[more]

JOHANNESBURG, September 2 – Leading African media executives are preparing to meet in Tanzania from 26-29 September for the 2010 edition of the Africa Media Leadership Conference (AMLC). This year’s summit will focus on identifying and developing “Sustainable Media Business Models in the Digital Age”.[more]

A Togolese court has indefinitely suspended the distribution of a Benin newspaper after crippling it with a defamation charge and heavy fines for publishing an article linking Togolese President Faure Essozimna Gnassingbé's brother with drug trafficking, report the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF).[more]

Five Ugandan judges ruled in favour of press freedom on 25 August by declaring the country's criminal sedition offense unconstitutional, report the Human Rights Network for Journalists - Uganda (HRNJ-Uganda) and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). But the government continues to threaten journalists with other legal actions.[more]

Journalism and media schools in South Africa have signed a joint statement opposing the proposed Protection of Information bill and Media Appeals Tribunal. In its current form, the bill offers provisions for the government to classify documents such as government contracts or those produced by state-owned enterprises as secret. Any journalist who published such documents could then face a lengthy jail sentence.[more]

Union leaders and journalists from across Africa will gather tomorrow, Thursday 2nd September 2010 at 9:30 am, at the headquarters of the African Union (AU) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia for a key meeting to discuss the safety and protection of journalists working across the continent.[more]

A petition launched by the Right2Know Campaign, a civil society-organized lobby, to defend the free flow of information and a free media: A responsive and accountable democracy that can meet the basic needs of our people is built upon transparency and the free flow of information. The gains of South Africans' struggle for freedom are threatened by the Protection of Information Bill (the Secrecy Bill) currently before Parliament. We accept the need to replace apartheid-era secrecy legislation. However, this Bill extends the veil of secrecy in a manner reminiscent of that same apartheid past.[more]

A Somali reporter was viciously stabbed to death in the Galkayo district of Puntland, a semi-autonomous region of Somalia, on 31 August, report the National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ), Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).[more]

The South Africa National Editors' Forum has announced the launch of "a coalition to spearhead efforts to promote and entrench freedom of speech across all levels of South African society." The Coalition for Free Speech will aim to challenge the Protection of Information Bill, seen as secrecy legislation, as well the African National Congress's proposed media appeals tribunal. [more]

The Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference has serious concerns about the wisdom and the constitutionality of the Protection of Information Bill currently before Parliament, as well as about the need for the establishment of a Media Appeals Tribunal. [more]

Kudakwashe Zvarayi, a Kwekwe-based freelance journalist in the Midlands province was on 27 August 2010 arrested in Bulawayo while taking pictures of the statue of Zimbabwe’s deceased Vice President Joshua Nkomo.[more]