7 July 2004
MISA, IFJ LOBBY FOR FREE EXPRESSION GUARANTEES AT AFRICAN UNION SUMMIT
As African heads of state gather this week in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, for the third summit of the African Union, a delegation of free expression organisations, including the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) and the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), has called on member countries to adopt treaty level guarantees for media freedom.
MISA and IFJ's Africa bureau have joined forces with Nobel Prize-winning writer Wole Soyinka, CREDO for Freedom of Expression and Associated Rights, FAHAMU and the Open Society Justice Initiative to lobby the African Union. Last week, they met with the chair of the Commission of the African Union, Professor Alpha Konare, and impressed upon him the urgent need for a "legal and institutional framework" in Africa for an environment conducive to media freedom.
The delegation argued that several countries, including Uganda and Ghana, were already moving in this direction and were laudable examples for other African governments to follow. Ghana has repealed criminal defamation laws and Uganda's highest court has ruled that "false news" provisions are incompatible with international standards on free expression.
The delegation warned that with attacks on journalists and media outlets increasing across the continent, the need was critical to set timelines for providing legal guarantees on media freedom. According to CREDO, there have been 102 reported cases of attacks on the media as of June 2004. If this trend continues, it could total more than 200 cases by year's end - an increase of nearly 20 per cent from 2003.
The lack of media freedom and freedom of expression is holding back the democratic development of Africa, the delegation warned.
MISA said "persistent official persecution, arbitrary harassment and physical intimidation make it impossible for African media to effectively and freely serve as a platform for the dissemination of news and information and as an avenue for debate."
Konare pledged to follow up on the organisation's requests.
The delegation's visit follows the issuing of a joint statement by six African organisations at the IFEX General Meeting in Baku, Azerbaijan, last month which called on African governments to "undertake a comprehensive review of all content-related offences, and in particular to ensure that criminal sanctions are removed from all such laws to bring them into conformity with international human rights standards."
The statement was endorsed by 22 other free expression groups (see: http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/59764/).
Visit these links:
- Statement by Delegation: http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/59920/
- African Union: http://www.africa-union.org/home/Welcome.htm
- BBC Primer on the African Union: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/country_profiles/3870303.stm
- African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights: http://www.achpr.org/
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