MEDIA-ETHIOPIA: Begins to Shut the Door on Foreign Journalists

By Moyiga Nduru Reprint | | Print |

Moyiga Nduru

NAIROBI, Feb 13 1998 (IPS) - Foreign journalists based in Kenya Friday sent a letter of protest to the Ethiopian government against new guidelines which, they say, will make it harder for them to cover the country.

Journalists must now apply for visas for Ethiopia 15 days before the date of their intended visit, specify in advance the purpose and itinerary of their visits and state which government authorities and officials they hope to meet.

The new guidelines were communicated to the Nairobi-based journalists, who provide the overwhelming majority of foreign news coverage about Ethiopia, in a letter from the Ethiopia Embassy in Kenya dated Jan 22.

In its protest letter to Ethiopia’s Minister of Information and Tourism, Wolde Michael Chamo, the Foreign Correspondents Association (FCA) of East Africa said the decision would prevent journalists from visiting Ethiopia freely to cover news events in that country.

“Coverage of the activities of the Organisation of African Unity and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, which have their headquarters in Addis Ababa, will also be badly affected by this measure,” said FCA chairman, Nicholas Kotch, in the statement issued on Friday.

Kotch said the FCA first learnt of the proposed guidelines last year. In a June 27, 1997 letter to Haddush Kassi, the head of press and information at the Ministry of Information and Tourism, Kotch listed the foreign journalists’ concerns about several aspects of the guidelines, including the 15-day visa rule.

“No written reply was received and we deeply regret that our representations were ignored,” he said.

Kotch added that such constraints on the freedom of the press were anachronistic and would be counter-productive. “It is ironic that they (the restrictions) were introduced as Addis Ababa prepares to host the Addis Forum on March 8 and 9 with the purpose of attracting foreign investment to Africa and Ethiopia,” he said.

According to him, potential foreign investors were thirsty for news about Africa and for signs of openness by governments. Ethiopia’s new restrictions on journalists will discourage investors on both counts, he said.

“Since the FCA was founded in 1964, its membership has shown its commitment to accurate reporting of Ethiopia’s tribulations and its achievements, sometimes at great physical risk,” said Kotch in the letter to Minister Chamo. “That tradition is imperilled by your ministry’s new visa policy.”

“The FCA urges your government to reconsider and to restore the former arrangement whereby visas to bona fida journalists were issued without delay,” said Kotch.

Ethiopia’s track record with its local and the foreign media has not been good. During the days of the late emperor Haile Selassie, toppled in 1974, and those of Col Mengistu Haile Mariam, overthrown by the present government in 1991, the media was viewed with a lot of suspicion. Foreign journalists were trailed by government officials wherever they went.

The situation has not changed much. “Even without the new regulations in place, Ethiopia is already a difficult place for foreign journalists to visit. Journalists are obliged to fill a number of forms at the airport, something which doesn’t happen in other African countries,” a European journalist told IPS on Friday.

Local journalists have been the target of government harassment and censorship. At least 20 are being held in jail in Ethiopia. Recently the international media lobby group, Reporters sans Frontiers (RSF), wrote to the Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi urging for the release of the 20, including editor Lulu Kebete.

Kebete, former editor-in-chief of the Amharic-language weekly ‘Nika’, was arrested for an article published in 1995, which criticised Ethiopia’s newly-elected federal assembly.

According to the RSF, Kebete was granted a cash bail of 300 U.S. dollars pending trial, but as he was unable to raise the money, he has remained in jail.

RSF also demanded an explanation for a fire on Jan. 16 that partially destroyed the premises of the Atbia Kokeb Publishing and Advertising Company, publishers of the Amharic weekly ‘Tobia’.

Kassahun Seboqa, former editor-in-chief of the independent weekly ‘Amharic’, fled to Kenya in December 1996, following “harassment and interrogation” by the country’s security personnel.

He claimed that he was picked up for running an interview of a relative of Selassie, and for writing other articles that centred on repressive laws, harassment of opposition leaders and wanton eviction of people from their houses.

According to an African journalist here, more and more countries are closing their doors on journalists. “It’s becoming hard to obtain entry visas to countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cameroon, Chad, the Sudan and Eritrea,” he said.