Uganda
Journalists battle with government over freedom of informationPosted Feb 13 2010
Two reporters from independent newspaper Monitor are saying the Ugandan government doesn’t believe in and uphold Freedom of information laws in the country. They sued in an effort to appeal the refusal of Uganda’s attorney general to give them certified copies of oil exploitation agreements they requested, but lost the case and were denied access to the documents by the chief magistrate.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), they were denied the copies because of an alleged confidentiality clause in the documents. But the reporters, Angelo Izama and Charles Mwanguhya, said that the documents and the information in them were of public interest. They believe that Ugandans should be able to hold the government and its partners accountable for all exploitation of oil.
But Chief Magistrate Deo Ssejjemba said his decision was made based on the fact that the journalists did not prove that there would be an actual benefit to disclosing the confidential information to the public. Both reporters say that they would like to appeal the ruling in the near future.
Freedom to information is a right upheld by both the United Nations and the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights. But the recent ruling makes it clear that the legislation will only be recognized when the government finds it necessary. This stall in rights for journalists doesn’t happen solely in Uganda, but in many other parts of Africa, including Kenya, Nigeria and Tanzania to name a few.
For example, CPJ claims that in Zimbabwe, legislation enacted to supposedly provide the press with information has been used to censor them.
According to an interview with Mukelani Dimba in The Daily News, the deputy chief executive officer of the Open Democracy Advice Centre, in South Africa, things aren’t much better.
“Only 40 percent of requests for information in South Africa are processed and attended,” Dimba says. “The rest are simply ignored.”