This Wednesday, the MFWA will release the first-ever report on a different casualty of Ebola: freedom of expression. This special report will highlight the restrictive environment for freedom of expression brought about by the outbreak of Ebola in West Africa. It will also illustrate the ways in which state and non-state actors have exacerbated the increasingly difficult situation for free expression.
Authorities in Liberia have banned journalists from entering Ebola Treatment Units (ETUs) which prevents journalists from reporting on issues related to Ebola.
The move, according to the authorities, is to protect patients’ privacy. Journalists will hence require the government’s permission to cover issues related to Ebola. Journalists could be arrested and prosecuted if they fail to get written permission from the health ministry before contacting Ebola patients, conducting interviews or filming or photographing healthcare facilities, officials said.
The initial announcement on the ban was made on October 2, 2014, the same day news went round that an American cameraman with the US television station NBC had tested positive for Ebola in Liberia. However, it is unclear if the two incidents are related.
“We have noted with great concern that photographs have been taken in treatment centres while patients are going in to be attended by doctors.” Tolbert Nyenswah, assistant minister of health and head of Liberia’s Ebola Incident Management, said. “That is invasion of the dignity, privacy and respect of patients.”
“Ebola patients are no different from any other patients. We should do that [report] under permission so that we don’t just take pictures or send out stories of naked people [in a way] that does not respect their privacy,” he added.
Journalists had continued their usual reporting practices until they attempted to cover the nationwide ‘slow day’ of action by healthcare workers who were demanding risk bonuses for taking care of Ebola patients. Then journalists were prevented from accessing ETUs and also threatened with arrests.
On October 9, during a discussion programme on Sky FM in Monrovia, the Liberian Deputy Information Minister for Public Affairs, Isaac Jackson, said, “Journalists are no longer allowed to enter ETUs. These journalists enter the ETUs and cross red lines. They violate people’s privacy, and take pictures that they will sell to international institutions. We are putting an end to that.”
Jackson also said that henceforth, reports by journalists on the Ebola outbreak in Liberia will be based on statements made by governments rather than what the journalists saw for themselves.
Efforts to contain the Ebola outbreak in West Africa have been associated with various forms of press freedom restrictions and attacks on journalists, which continue to hamper the provision of timely and accurate information to the public. The MFWA recently released a report on the implications of Ebola on freedom of expression, including press freedom. The report can be accessed here.
For more information please contact
Sulemana Braimah
Executive Director
MFWA
Accra
Tel: 233-0302-24 24 70
Fax: 233-0302-22 10 84
On October 9, 2014, a court in Kenema City in eastern Sierra Leone fined Ibrahim J. Ganda, a journalist with Radio Vaahun, a privately-owned Liberian radio station, for illegally entering “a quarantined zone in Sierra Leone.”
According to the MFWA’s correspondent in Sierra Leone, Ganda was arrested on October 5 in Kailahun district in the eastern region while traveling to Radio Moa in Kailahun District, which borders Liberia.
Ganda had to either pay a fine of one million Leones (about US $200) or serve a four-month jail term. The journalist paid the fine and returned to Liberia.
Even though there have been no official pronouncements banning journalists from going to some places, the Assistant Inspector General of Police in the Eastern Region, Afred Karrow Kamara, insisted that Ganda could not go to the zone in question. Kamara also said the journalist had no legal documents to enter Sierra Leone, although as a citizen of a West African country, the journalist could stay in Sierra Leone without a resident or working permit for 90 days.
In an interview with the MFWA’s Sierra Leone correspondent, the Eastern Region Chairman of the Sierra Leone Association of Journalists (SLAJ), Bob Batilo Saffa, said Ganda is, in fact, a Sierra Leonean journalist working in Liberia. Saffa described the incident as “mere scam built out of malice” and added that many officials in the area are aware of the good working relationship between Radio Vaahun in Liberia and Radio Moa in Sierra Leone.
The MFWA’s correspondent also reported that due to this action against the journalist, journalists in the area have instituted a media blackout on all police activities in the area until further notice.
Governments and officials in West Africa, especially in countries affected by the Ebola outbreak are increasingly violating journalists’ right to freedom of expression and also citizens’ right to access information. A recent report by the MFWA on the implications of Ebola on freedom of expression illustrates how press freedom restrictions are impeding access to timely and accurate information on Ebola.
The media regulatory authority in Togo, the High Authority for the Electronic Media Broadcasting and Communication (Haute Autorité de l’audiovisuel et de la communication-HAAC), closed the head office of the online newspaper Afrika Express Info.
On October 1, 2014 the HAAC issued a communiqué accusing the director of Afrika Express Info, Carmel Max Savi, a Beninese national, of not having obtained prior authorization to open his office in the Togolese capital, Lomé, and of devoting nearly all of his articles to a “disinformation campaign on Togo.”
According to the MFWA’s correspondent in Togo, the HAAC also drew Savi’s attention to the illegal existence of his office after the HAAC received an invitation to the official launch of Afrika Express Info on September 24. The HAAC asked Savi to suspend the launch and to regularize his status first.
The media regulatory body said Savi held a press conference and made a “biased reference to the interaction … and told lies.” Savi reportedly said that no regulatory framework exists in Togo for the online media and so he was not at fault.
The HAAC subsequently shut down the head office of Afrika Express Info, pursuant to Article 2 of its organic law which provides that “the organic law shall apply to newspapers, official and private electronic media and other means of communication.”
Savi’s problems with the HAAC have been ongoing for several years now.
An article published on Afrika Express Info reported on the health of the HAAC president Biossey Kokou Tozoun, and according to the MFWA’s correspondent, this did not sit well with the regulatory body.
Apart from the aforementioned online publication, Savi also operates the Tribune d’Afrique newspaper, which is based in Benin with an office in Lomé. In Togo, there have been many court cases involving this paper.
In May 2010, the Tribune d’Afrique published a controversial article, titled “The white powder that blackens the presidential palaces: Drug trafficking at the Head of State.” The article alleged that Mey Gnassingbé, Special Adviser to the Presidency and half-brother of the Togolese President Faure Gnassingbé, was involved in drug trafficking. Mey Gnassingbé sued the newspaper for “publication of false news and defamation.”
Regional and international communication experts have developed clear and harmonized messages to address the information gap in national and regional responses to the Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) which has claimed more than 3,000 lives from the more than 6,000 cases reported in the ECOWAS region.
In addition to the strategic and key behaviour change messages designed to sensitize and elicit appropriate actions from targeted audiences in the Ebola affected and non-affected countries in West Africa, the experts at their 29-30 September, 2014 workshop in Accra, also identified appropriate channels for the transmission of the messages.
The messages are crafted in simple, direct and action-oriented language to elicit maximum impact and responses from the target audiences for the effective prevention, containment, management and control of the deadly Ebola disease.
The target audiences for the messages include the public, community, opinion, traditional and religious leaders, infected persons, their families, survivors, health workers, and border communities. Others are educational institutions, armed and security forces, the private sector, hunters and bush meat sellers, traditional healers and birth attendants, nursing mothers, mortuary attendants and the media.
The experts also developed an Action Plan with timelines for capacity building for the media and mass mobilization actors, anchored on a coordinated emergency communication response strategy using effective multi-media messaging tools.
Participants at the workshop, which was a follow-up to the ECOWAS Coordinating Ministerial Group Meeting for the implementation of the Regional Operational Plan on the fight against Ebola included health officials from the Ebola affected countries, representatives of WHO, UNICEF, the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the Abidjan-Lagos Corridor and the John Hopkins University Centre for Communications.
Others were the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), West Africa Democracy Radio, West African Civil Society Forum, officials of the ECOWAS Commission and the West African Health Organization (WAHO), the specialized health institution of ECOWAS.
The workshop was organized by WAHO and the ECOWAS Commission on the heels of the Ministerial Coordinating and Technical Monitoring and Surveillance Groups’ meetings on Ebola regional response for mass mobilization and community participation, both held in the Ghanaian capital last week.
Samuel Amète Sarr, a former Minister of Energy under the Abdoulaye Wade regime who is charged with libeling the Senegalese President Macky Sall, was granted bail on October 1, 2014.
Sarr’s detention and trial is as a result of a post he made on his Facebook page on August 18. He posted a bank account number, which he alleged belonged to President Macky Sall.
The post also alleged that the president had enriched himself illegally. In addition, he asked the Senegalese Judiciary to find out who owns the bank account, which is credited with an amount of FCFA 7 billion (about US $14 million).
Sarr was arrested on August 19 and charged with libelling the Head of State on August 20, an offence punishable by Article 80 of the Senegalese Criminal Code.
Sarr also alleged that William Bourdon, who is the president and founder of Sherpa—an association that protect victims of economic crimes—and who has been instrumental in the ongoing corruption case against Karim Wade, former minister and son of President Wade, had failed to investigate President Sall because he was “paid handsome amounts of money by the State.”
If found guilty, Sarr faces between three to five years in jail and a fine between FCFA 100,000–1,500,000 (about US $200–US $3000).
The Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) joins the rest of the World to commemorate International Right to Information Day, a day of activism to raise awareness about the importance of the right of Access to Information (ATI).
As a fundamental human right, the right to information – to seek, access and receive information, allows access by the general public to data held by national governments. It establishes a legal process by which requests may be made for government-held information, to be received freely or at minimal cost, barring standard exceptions. It is a human right guaranteed by Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 9 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and Article 4 of the Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression in Africa.
The world has seen progressive improvements in the adoption of Access to Information laws with only 12 countries worldwide in 1990 to about 100 countries having such laws today. In Africa, the 2014 report by the African Freedom of Information Centre (AFIC) indicates that only 13 of the 54 countries have adopted national Access to Information laws with six of these in the West Africa region: Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Cote d’Ivoire and Niger.
Despite the slow but steady progress in the adoption of FOI/ATI laws in the West Africa region, it is worth mentioning that this handful is challenged with implementation while other countries such as Ghana have also lagged in the adoption of the law for over a decade; largely due to an absence of political will, human and financial resources and technical expertise.
It is widely acknowledged that the centrality of access to information lies in its importance in the promotion and protection of fundamental human rights and in advancing democratic values and accountability and sustainable development. As the world celebrates Right to Information 2014 thus, the MFWA adds its voice to calls for the passage of FOI/ATI in countries that currently do not have in order to advance the course of right of access to government information, open, transparent and accountable governance.
Headquartered in Ghana, and a member of the country’s Right to Information Coalition, the MFWA is particularly worried about the delay in amending and passing the bill into law as it constitutes a betrayal of public trust in the institution of parliament. We therefore urge Ghana’s parliament to expedite action on the bill as it facilitates the public’s constitutional right to information and also conforms to international standards and best practices most of which Ghana is a signatory to.
Windhoek, Namibia, 26 September 2014: As information activists around the world celebrate the right to information on 28th September, the African Platform on Access to Information (APAI) reiterates its call to UNESCO and the African Union (AU) to formally recognize 28th September as International Right to Information Day to promote the right.
The APAI Working Group urges the AU Commission to table a proposal at the next AU Summit asking the Heads of States and Government of the AU to adopt 28th September as African “Right to Information Day” and to initiate an Experts Group to develop further instruments to strengthen the right of access to information on the continent, as proposed in the APAI Declaration adopted in Cape Town, South Africa, on 19th September 2011.
Similarly, we urge UNESCO, through its next General Conference, to proclaim 28th September as International Right to Information Day and to recommend to the United Nations General Assembly they endorse the proclamation and set the date aside as a day to raise awareness about the importance of the right of access to information throughout the world.
UNESCO and the AU Commission have been valuable partners to the APAI Working Group in the process of developing and adopting the APAI Declaration, which seeks to promote the right of access to information and outlines principles aimed at advancing the right in Africa.
“Three years after the adoption of this critically important Declaration and Action Plan, we are convinced that the time has come to take concrete steps to ensure that the objectives of the Declaration are realized and that the right of access to information becomes real and meaningful for all African citizens”, says Edetaen Ojo, Chair of the APAI Working Group.
The Working Group notes the important steps already taken by some AU organs, particularly the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which adopted Resolution 222 on 2nd May 2012, at its 50th Ordinary Session held in Banjul, The Gambia, wherein it requested the AU to consider proclaiming 28 September as International Right to Information Day in Africa, as proposed in the APAI Declaration; and the Pan African Parliament, which formally recognized the APAI Declaration in its “Midrand Declaration”, adopted on 15th May 2013.
The Working Group is gratified by the increasing number of national laws on access to information passed by African countries in the last few years and calls for greater efforts to ensure the laws are implemented effectively and realize their full potential.
We also call on other African countries lagging behind to urgently pass similar laws guaranteeing their citizens a right to information, consistent with the standards established by the Model Law on Access to Information, developed by the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa and adopted by the African Commission.
About the APAI Working Group
The Working Group of the African Platform on Access to Information (APAI) is a network of civil society organisations promoting access to information in Africa. The APAI Declaration sets out the key principles that need to be satisfied to fully realise the right of access to information. The Declaration was adopted by stakeholders present at the first Pan African Conference on Access to Information (PACAI) held 17th to 19th September 2011 in Cape Town, South Africa. Members of the Working Group include:
• Africa Freedom of Information Centre (AFIC)
• Article 19
• Federation of African Journalists (FAJ)
• Highway Africa
• Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA)
• Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA)
• Media Rights Agenda (MRA)
• Open Democracy Advice Centre (ODAC)
• The African Editors’ Forum (TAEF)
For further information, please contact:
The APAI Secretariat
Email: [email protected]
www.africanplatform.org
The African Declaration on Internet Rights and Freedoms is a Pan-African initiative to promote human rights standards and principles of openness in internet policy formulation and implementation on the continent. The idea for an African Declaration on Internet Rights and Freedoms was agreed on, at the 2013 African Internet Governance Forum in Nairobi, Kenya.
It elaborates on the principles which are necessary to uphold human and people’s rights on the internet, and to cultivate an internet environment that can best meet Africa’s social and economic development needs and goals.
Read the African Declaration on Internet Rights and Freedoms here
In our most recent Guinea alert, the MFWA reported that nine members of a team raising awareness on Ebola were killed. The MFWA correspondent has informed us that while earlier reports said that nine team members died, later information said that only eight died. Three of these eight were journalists.
Villagers in Womey kidnapped nine team members, and all were said to have died. However, on the day of the burial, the authorities said that one kidnapped team member had escaped. Thus, one person out of the nine dead bodies was not a member of the awareness-raising campaign and had died because of other circumstances.
The Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), has appointed Mr. Byron Taylor, as Managing Consultant of the Organisation’s newly-established Consultancy Unit.
Until his appointment, Byron Taylor was the Chief Executive Officer of CSR Foundation, Ghana, and had also previously served as Executive Secretary for the Institute of Public Relations, Ghana. Byron Taylor was Columnist for Weekend World newspaper formerly published by Global Media Alliance. In the USA, Byron Taylor worked as a marketing executive for Huntington Bank and also was a columnist for African Weekender magazine and the Star newspaper in Columbus, Ohio.
The creation of the Consultancy Unit is part of the MFWA’s ongoing organisational sustainability initiatives. The MFWA is the leading non-profit, independent press freedom and freedom of expression advocacy organisation in West Africa.
The Consultancy Unit is poised to become a unique and the most reliable Centre for Media Research; Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Concept Development and Advisory Service; Media Relations Skills Training; in Ghana and the West Africa Sub-Region.
We congratulate Mr. Taylor on his appointment and welcome him to the MFWA family. We know his rich background will help initiate innovative ideas and programmes to offer world class solutions to our partners.
The latest media ethics monitoring report by the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) shows that indecency in language is the most prevalent ethical violation among the Ghanaian media.
The report reveals that out of a total of 508 ethical violations recorded from May to August 2014, violations against the principle of Decency recorded as much as 201, representing 40 percent of all the ethical violations recorded so far. The report further shows that news websites committed the most ethical violations with Ghanaweb.com being the worst culprit.
Comparatively, the incidence of ethical violations in the 40 Ghanaian media that are being monitored have slighly reduced from 152 in July to 135 in August.
Accra-based Adom FM has over the last four months seen a consistent reduction in ethical violations. Another notable finding from the report is the fact that the Today newspaper, which had recorded the highest number of ethical infractions in the months of June and July, did not register any ethical violation in August.
Of significant mention are the following radio stations and newspapers which have not recorded any ethical violation so far: ATL FM, New Crusading Guide, Peace FM, Public Agenda, Radio Gurune, and Radio Peace. The others are: Radio Progress, Radio Savanna, Rite FM, ROK FM, and Suncity FM.
The monitoring of ethical violations in the Ghanaian media forms part of the MFWA’s project, “Promoting Professional Standards and Enhancing the Watchdog Role of the Ghanaian Media,” with funding from STAR-Ghana. The aim of the project is to contribute to improved professional standards in the Ghanaian media and support them to play a more effective role in fostering transparent and accountable governance in Ghana through critical and investigative reporting.
Please click here for the full report.
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