Organisationen “Reportere uden Grænser” råber vagt i gevær over nye stramninger i pressefriheden og borgernes muligheder for at ytre sig frit på internettet – sofistikeret strategi skal begrænse ytringsfriheden, hedder det i en presseudtalelse.
Ethiopia’s state-owned Ethio-Telecom has just installed a system for blocking access to the Tor network, which lets users browse (søge) anonymously on the internet and access blocked websites. At the same time, the state-owned printing presses are demanding the right to censor the newspapers they print.
Reporters Without Borders accuses the biggest state printer, Berhanena Selam, which almost has a monopoly on newspaper and magazine printing in Ethiopia, and other state owned printers, of trying to impose political censorship on media content before publication.
In a proposed “standard contract for printing” recently circulated by state printers, they assume the right to vet and reject articles prior to printing.
“This contract could drag Ethiopia back more than two decades as regards media freedom, to the time of Mengistu’s brutal dictatorship in pre 1991 Ethiopia,” Reporters Without Borders said, adding:
“Allowing printers to control editorial content is tantamount to give them court powers. On what basis do these state-owned companies assume the right and independence to interpret the law? Does this reflect a government desire to suppress all criticism before it is voiced?
“If this standard contract is adopted, we fear it could lead to widespread self-censorship, which is already very common, and to media subservience towards the government. Criticism, independence and media diversity would all suffer, and the vitality of Ethiopian democracy would suffer as well.”
Article 10 of the proposed contract is evocatively entitled “Declining to print content violating the law.” It says the printer has the right to refuse to print any text if he has “adequate reason” to think it breaks the law.
It goes on to say that the printer reserves the right to terminate or cancel the contract at any time if he has “adequate reason” to think that the publisher “has a propensity to publish a content which entails liability.”
This article contravenes article 29 of the 1994 federal constitution, which guarantees press freedom and bans “censorship in any form.” Reporters Without Borders points out that only an independent and impartial judge should have the power to impose any kind of sanction or prohibition affecting media freedom.
Joint petition to the Prime Minister
Ethiopia’s privately-owned newspaper and magazine publishers reacted to the proposed contract by addressing a joint petition to Prime Minister Meles Zenawi urging him to recognize that it violates the constitution and to have it withdrawn.
The response from a government official was to insist that it was “a strictly business-based decision” and to deny any desire to censor.
The printers are keeping up the pressure on the publishers, saying they will refuse to print any newspapers or magazines and, under an unlawful contract that is an extension of the new press law that has put liabilities on printers for print media content.
“We call on all media professionals – publishers, editors and journalists – to be brought into the process of negotiation and drafting of this printing contract,” Reporters Without Borders said, noting:
“The possibility that printers could be held liable for printed content must not be used as grounds for reintroducing prior censorship.”
As it stands, the proposed contract would add to the legislative edifice (bygningsværk) that the Ethiopian government has built over the past three years.
It includes the 2009 anti-terrorism law under which two journalists have been charged and sentenced to long jail terms. It is also liable to exacerbate the already poor climate between the privately-owned media and government.
More information about freedom of information in Ethiopia on
http://en.rsf.org/report-ethiopia,16.html
Government steps up control, using sophisticated technology
Læs videre på
http://en.rsf.org/ethiopia-government-steps-up-control-of-07-06-2012,42735.html
