SIERRA LEONE-MEDIA: Honeymoon Between Government and Press Ends

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

FREETOWN, Oct 14 1996 (IPS) - The arrest and detention of journalists here in recent weeks appears to mark the end of the honeymoon between the independent press and the seven-month old government of President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah.

On Friday, editor Sheka Tawaralli was jailed for a month after appearing before parliament to defend a story carried in his newspaper, the ‘Torchlight’. On Saturday, the editor of another weekly, ‘123’, was charged with seditious libel.

The Sierra Leone Association of Journalists (SLAJ) has condemned what it sees as “a move towards an anti-press stance” although it has also implicity admitted that some newspapers may have gone overboard.

“What we have to do is regulate the profession from within by suggesting to the government the establishment of a press council, increase discplinary measures for journalists and require minimum entry qualifications for journalists,” said SLAJ Secretary- General Richie Gordon.

The crackdown began in late September, when Edison Yongai, editor of ‘The Point’ newspaper, became the first journalist to be detained since an elected government replaced a four-year-old military junta in March.

“I was arrested and detained at the headquarters of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) for five days,” said Yongai. “I was then charged to court and refused bail and then taken to the maximum security prison at Pademba Road (in Freetown.”

He was charged for libel in connection with a story, run in July in his paper, which accused the government of “wasting state funds on reckless issues”. He was freed when the case was thrown out by a Freetown court in early October.

A few days later, on Oct. 7, police arrested Hilton Fyle, editor of the weekly ‘123’ newspaper, for accusing government ministers of taking bribes from a business tycoon and a former senior official of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), both of whom are on trial for alleged corruption.

The ‘123’ editor was released a few hours later, but libel charges were brought against him on Saturday, one day after Tawaralli appeared before parliament in connection with an Oct. 9 report in the ‘Torchlight’ captioned ‘Tejan Kabbah bribes MPs’.

The front-page story accused the president of bribing parliamentarians to soften their “aggressive stance” on presidential nominations to senior government posts. ‘Torchlight’ publisher Dr. Y.M. Koroma later disassociated himself from the story and ordered the cessation of the paper’s publication.

Tawaralli was charged with contempt of parliament and sentenced to one month in jail when he appeared before the legislative college on Friday. He was immediately whisked off to the Pademba Road maximum security prison.

“I believe the ‘Torchlight’ story was reckless,” commented a senior government official. “I think that journalists are taking advantage of the new political dispensation. Even though I don’t support a clampdown on journalists, I think it is time someone checks these messengers of wrong and bad news.”

The government says it is not clamping down on the press.

“We regard the press as any other private business. We want to give full expression to the right of people to freely express themselves, without hindrances,” Information Minister George Banda Thomas told IPS. “I cannot visualise a situation where we could take measures to either cut down on the number of newspapers or in any way try to muzzle the press.”

However, the sometimes unsubstantiated reports of official corruption that have been appearing in the media have apparently led the state to take steps to regulate the press.

“It is important that given the present atmosphere, the regulations that have been suggested to me by SLAJ and other existing regulations, there is need to come out with a prescription that could ensure that we improve on the quality of papers and qualifications of reporters and editors,” Thomas said.

There are 35 newspapers registered in Sierra Leone, none of them dailies. Most struggle to make ends meet and pay their journalists little. Stories abound here of reporters and editors taking money from corrupt politicians and business people to write glamorously about them or to cover up their dirty deals.

“We are currently working on the regulations submitted to us by SLAJ in addition to existing ones,” said Banda Thomas. “We hope that will improve the standards here.”