Addis Tribune (Addis Ababa)
24 January 2003
editorial
Oh, yes, it's the title, stupid. Even from the outset, the agenda prepared by the government for its recent discussion with members of the private press was, in itself, quite telling. In a three-day conference sponsored by the British Embassy here, the Minister of Information and his deputies took a commanding position at the Saba Hall of the Ghion Hotel to dictate to members of the independent press the "problems" of the private press in Ethiopia.
Any genuine predisposition to work towards the improvement of the media would have avoided discussions on the problems of the private press in favor of the shortcomings of the press in Ethiopia in general. It follows then that the preparation of the agenda in the first place demonstrated the government's deliberate attempt to portray the private media in a negative light and, in fact, also to demonstrate its gross contempt for and legendary hatred of the independent media, which, despite the cruel mishandling by the government in most of their members during the past decade, have been applying badly needed services to the public at large.
It was thus no surprise that the conference was marred even from the outset with representatives of the Ethiopian Free Press Journalists Association walking out of the conference, protesting, rightly, that they were not given the opportunity to present their views on the occasion.
The minister, however, irresponsibly dismissed their protests by saying that they were invited just as any ordinary members of the private press, and not as legitimate representatives in general. Any sane person would observe here that any effort to work for the betterment of the activities of the private press or deal with the problems, as they proclaim, of the independent press would be painfully incomplete without the equal and active participation of the latter in the deliberations. A handful of panelists selected from different government offices, however, had been made to present papers that also subtly attempted to put forward "researched literature" that would bolster the governments case against members of the private press.
The deadliest part of the conference, however, emerged in the late hours of the sessions when the minister proudly put on the table a new "draft press law" prepared by the government with a view to its anticipated alleviation of the problem seen regarding the private press and for the flourishing of a "responsible" independent press in Ethiopia. It was obvious that the unanimous sense of shock experienced by members of the private press to discover the even more precarious mess awaiting their fate with the possibility of having to live with the deadly new press law soon to make its way to parliament for approval.
Obviously an even more restrictive amendment to the previous press law, which also has its flaws, the draconian new law was prepared exclusively by agents of the government without the participation of representatives of the private press or the public. Shocked with this potential nightmare, the editors of some eight private newspapers gathered separately, discussed their grievances and issued a set of statements denouncing the new draft press law in the strongest possible terms. They also demanded that the government abandon the destructive path it had initiated in the draft press law and rather to try to commit itself to the respect of the freedom of expression of people. They also called upon all members of society and international bodies to put pressure on the government to revise its dangerous trend in favor of the free flow of information and the right to freedom of expression in the country. If all fail, however, and once this new law gets issued, many fear that we can totally forget the private press in Ethiopia as non-existent and return to the old ways of repression experienced in previous governments.
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