New York, February 29, 2008—CPJ condemns the arbitrary arrest of two popular online editors without charge. The two were detained and interrogated for 24 hours in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, on February 18, in what observers of the case say was a politically motivated attempt to shutter the site. The two young editors, Maxence Mello…
New York, January 8, 2008—Police in Dar-es-Salaam said Monday that they had two suspects in custody after armed men stormed the newsroom of a popular vernacular newspaper and seriously injured two top journalists, according to local reporters and news accounts. Managing Editor Saed Kubenea of the Kiswahili-language Mwana Halisi and veteran journalist Ndimara Tegambwage, a…
SEPTEMBER 10, 2005 Posted: September 21, 2005 Mpoki Bukuku, The Sunday Citizen ATTACKED A group of prison wardens and prisoners acting on their orders assaulted Bukuku, chief photographer for the private Sunday Citizen, as he attempted to cover the eviction of families from houses that were being repossessed by the Tanzanian Prisons Department. The houses…
New York, June 10, 2005—Authorities on the semi-autonomous Tanzanian island of Zanzibar have banned political columnist Jabir Idrissa from writing, saying he was working without permission. Idrissa told the Committee to Protect Journalists that he believes he was banned for criticizing the Zanzibar government. The Zanzibar-based Idrissa is a well-known political columnist for the weekly,…
JUNE 9, 2005 Updated: June 24, 2005 Jabir Idrissa, Rai CENSORED Authorities on the semi-autonomous Tanzanian island of Zanzibar banned political columnist Jabir Idrissa from writing, saying he was working without permission. Idrissa told the Committee to Protect Journalists that he believes he was banned for criticizing the Zanzibar government.
New York, November 30, 2004—The popular weekly Dira, Zanzibar’s only independent newspaper, remains shuttered after a court refused to reverse a one-year-old government ban. The Committee to Protect Journalists called on authorities to lift the “outrageous” ban, and repeal laws that allow the government to silence critical reporting. The High Court on Tanzania’s semi-autonomous island…
Although the number of journalists in prison in Africa at the end of 2003 was lower than the previous year, African journalists still faced a multitude of difficulties, including government harassment and physical assaults. Many countries in Africa retain harsh press laws. In the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, some…
New York, November 25, 2003—The government of Zanzibar, a semiautonomous island off the coast of Tanzania, has ordered the indefinite suspension of the independent weekly Dira, according to local journalists and international press reports. Dira, the island’s most popular newspaper, has been highly critical of the government. Editor Ali Nabwa told CPJ that Dira received…