1 February 2008
Addis Ababa — The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has urged Prime Minister Meles Zenawi on Wednesday to intervene by reversing the denial of publishing licenses to five independent journalists, who were freed from prison last year.
"We are writing to express our great concern about the government's denial of publishing licenses to five independent Ethiopian journalists freed last year from prison. We are calling on you to use all your influence to remove such administrative restraints, which contradict the government's public assurances last year that former prisoners would be allowed to resume their work.", CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon said in his letter to the PM.
According to the letter seen by the Daily Monitor, Award-winning publisher Serkalem Fasil, her husband, columnist Eskinder Nega, and publisher Sisay Agena have fulfilled all legal requirements to launch two newspapers.
"They submitted applications for Lualawi and Habesha-current affairs Amharic-language weeklies-after applying for the publishing license in mid-September of last year." Yet the head of the Press Licensing and Permit Office, Fantahun Asres, informed the journalists by phone only on January 1 that their applications had been denied without explanation, Eskinder Nega was cited in the letter as saying.
"By comparison, the ministry approved the registration of newly launched current affairs weekly Addis Neger within one hour of submitting an application in October, according to owner and editor Mesfin Negash, who was never jailed" Accordingly, the same day in January 1, Fantahun also informed publishers Dawit Kebede and Wosonseged Gebrekidan by phone that their applications to launch two other weeklies, Awramba Times and Harambe, were "totally unacceptable," the journalists told CPJ.
"(Dawit) Kebede, who submitted all required documents under Ethiopia's 1992 press law on December 15, said officials at the ministry additionally required him to submit a document describing his editorial policy for Awramba Times." The journalists had asked for a formal written response from the ministry after submitting the policy description, Dawit was cited in the letter as having said.
Ethiopia's press law stipulates that a new newspaper is considered registered by default if it does not receive a government response within 30 days, but an official letter of certification from the Ministry of Information is required to obtain a mandatory commercial license. The ministry is officially mandated to "facilitate conditions for the expansion of the country's media both in variety and in numbers," the letter reads quoting the law.
"As an organization of journalists dedicated to defending our colleagues worldwide, we call on you to ensure that the government removes the barriers that prevent these five journalists from launching their newspapers-a right that the state cannot to deny any citizen who has fulfilled all legal requirements under the press law." The media rights group said the newspapers being planned would have been Ethiopia's first independent political publications since the government banned eight vernacular papers and forced at least a dozen others to close after the 2005 deadly post-election unrest.
It reminded the Prime Minister that his government, in public statements last year following the release of several journalists jailed since 2005, asserted it had "no sense of revenge" toward former prisoners, and that the journalists could resume their activities, barring "any subversive action against the Constitution." The letter was copied to several individuals and organisations, including Freedom House, Human Rights Watch, International Centre for Journalists and the International Federation of Journalists.
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