25 August 2008
Maputo — Freedom of the press in Mozambique shrinks the further one moves away from Maputo, according to Tomas Vieira Mario, the chairperson of the Mozambican chapter of the regional press freedom body, MISA (Media Institute of Southern Africa).
Interviewed in Monday's issue of the Maputo daily "Noticias", Vieira Mario, who was re-elected for a further two year term of office at a MISA general meeting last week, said that the great openness the media enjoy in Maputo "sometimes hides the real country from us".
What happens lower down the administrative ladder, in rural districts and localities, is quite different. "In the districts, freedom of the press is still something strange for the great majority of local public authorities", he accused.
The figure of the district administrator, Vieira Mario argued, had so far escaped all the reforms that have reshaped the Mozambican state, and essentially he continued the traditions of the colonial local state. At the heart of the district administrator's form of exercising power was the idea that "he is the chief of the territory, not the idea, contained in the public sector reform, that he is a democratic facilitator".
Far from being a facilitator, the district administrator trended to be "a centralizing figure, who believes that he is the centre of power", said Vieira Mario. "This is reflected in everything that goes on in the district. Sometimes a simple survey in the district can be stopped if the administrator has not been informed. He can order the survey stopped to find out who the people are, where have they come from, and why are they doing this work. As for freedom of the press, basically he doesn't know about it".
Vieira Mario argued that this was not just a question of better academic training for administrators, but one of an attitude towards power.
Perhaps more shocking is that the provincial branches of the Public Prosecutor's Office, far from upholding the fundamental rights of citizens, violate them, when those citizens are journalists. A flagrant example, said Vieira Mario, took place in the central province of Manica in 2006, when the deputy provincial attorney ordered three journalists from a community newspaper to be thrown into jail for supposedly libeling a local businessman - even though preventive detention is not permitted in cases of libel.
"Obviously it was all fabricated", said Vieira Mario, and had MISA not intervened the three might have spent a lengthy period in jail "because, in compliance with their duties, they discovered and denounced a local businessman who stole livestock from the population of Barue district and sold it to South African farmers".
The businessman was an influential figure in Barue, so the order went out to arrest the journalists and they were thrown into jail, even though there was no formal complaint against them, and no case was opened that they could respond to.
That case "symbolizes the attitude of local powers outside Maputo and shows that the further we move away from the capital, the more our fundamental freedoms are diminished".
Judges too abused their powers, notably by holding trials behind closed doors. Such trials had occurred in Beira and Pemba, he recalled, against local journalists. Vieira Mario argued that this happened "because the judges are aware that they may commit blunders". So to hide their mistakes, they kicked the public out of their courtrooms.
In some cases "they even tell court clerks not to reveal the content of their rulings. This happened in Beira. These questions are very serious".
Conflicts between the media and the judiciary were on the increase, particularly with a sharp increase in the number of libel cases. Vieira Mario thought this reflected a genuine increase in misconduct in the public administration, and a greater capacity of the press to denounce abuses.
Those accused reacted by dragging journalists before the courts. Vieira Mario noted that accusations in the press against politicians, even if based on anonymous sources, are often motivated by public interest considerations. "Unfortunately, practice shows us that judges never pay attention to questions of public interest. They're not going to check whether or not public interest was involved, whether publication was in good faith", he said.
He added that, if journalists have to appear in court, they should ensure the services of a good lawyer, who understands the constitutionally enshrined right to information, and why journalists are entitled not to reveal their sources. "What the judge should want to know in court is the truth of the facts, and not who told them to you", Vieira Mario said.
He admitted there had been abuses in the press, when journalists knowingly published falsehoods. This could only be fought against by ensuring that each of the media has a code of ethics, and that journalists understand their ethical responsibilities.
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