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Togolese journalists at Saturday's protest. (Sylvio Combey)

Dozens of Togolese journalists marched in the capital, Lomé, on Saturday to call attention to reported allegations that government security agents planned to retaliate against critical reporters. The allegations themselves are in dispute--the government called them "fabricated"--but they are set against a recent U.N. report expressing concern over the official use of arbitrary detention and the alleged use of torture.

New York, August 26, 2010--The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns Wednesday's ruling by a criminal court judge in Togo to indefinitely ban the distribution of a Benin newspaper that had raised questions about the alleged involvement of a half-brother of President Faure Gnassingbé in drug trafficking.
 Didier Ledoux snapped this photo minutes before Lt. Colonel Romuald Létondot, seen here, confronted him. (Courtesy Didier Ledoux)
It has been a week since Togolese photojournalist Komi Agbedivlo, better known as "Didier Ledoux," was verbally abused by a military officer from France as he covered a political demonstration in the capital, Lome. The incident might have gone unnoticed, if not for social media and a year charged with historical symbolism for Togo, which is celebrating 50 years of independence from France. So the day, far from going unnoticed, has lived on through the Internet.

Togo’s press suffers malaise 50 years after independence

The author in the studios of TVT in 1976. (TVT)

In the year marking the 50th anniversary of Togo’s independence, the Togolese press is suffering from an obvious malaise—a malaise perceived by the informed citizen and not by communications professionals themselves. This malaise transpires in the daily practice of journalism through the lack of professionalism. If elsewhere the media is stifled under the heel of power, in Togo, the state, in its “complicit neutrality,” watches the press drift below minimum journalistic ethics where the crosschecking of information before its dissemination is wanting. 

Your Excellencies: As you gather in Paris for festivities that celebrate your nations’ 50 years of independence, we, the undersigned African press freedom advocates petition for your public commitment to a free, vibrant, and self-sustaining press as a cornerstone of the development of francophone Africa in the next five decades.

Angolan police escort the Togolese team bus in the aftermath of the deadly attack. (Reuters/Amr Abdallah Dalsh)On January 8, while Angola was hosting the African Cup of Nations, the country made worldwide headlines after a deadly attack on the Togolese national soccer team, which left a coach and a journalist dead. With international attention turning to the story, a shroud of state censorship and self-censorship by the Angolan media obscured the factual circumstances of the attack and its aftermath.

A soldier stands guard before an African Nations Cup banner. (AFP)New York, January 11, 2010—The Committee to Protect Journalists called today on Angolan authorities to ensure the safety of sports journalists covering the African Nations Cup following the death of a Togolese sports journalist on Friday. Stanislas Ocloo was gunned down in the attack on Togo’s national soccer team’s bus in the northwestern Angolan enclave of Cabinda. Also killed was assistant coach Hamelet Abulo, according to Angola's official ANGOP news agency. As many as three people were killed and nine injured in the strike, CNN reported today.

Government bans critical radio journalist from broadcast

FEBRUARY 19, 2008

Posted March 10, 2008

Daniel Lawson-Drackey, Nana FM
CENSORED

Togo’s Broadcast and Communication High Authority (known by its French acronym, HAAC) summarily banned all editorials and commentary of veteran journalist and media activist Daniel Lawson-Drackey on private station Nana FM, according to local journalists and news reports.

When Press Freedom and Democracy Are Out of Step
By Tom Rhodes

Ballots may have replaced bullets in much of Africa since the dawn of this new century, but one of the great political ironies for at least part of the continent has been a loss of press freedom following the voting. Leaders in a large swath of sub-Saharan Africa have drawn approving nods from Western politicians for holding sometimes unprecedented elections. Three such countries are the Gambia, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and Ethiopia. All have democratically elected presidents and Western support. Yet between them they hold the unenviable record of placing at or near the top of CPJ's 2007 list of the world's worst backsliders on press freedom.
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Africa

Advocacy Coordinator:
Mohamed Keita

East Africa Consultant:
Tom Rhodes

mkeita@cpj.org
trhodes@cpj.org

Tel: 212-465-1004
ext. 117
Fax: 212-465-9568

330 7th Avenue, 11th Floor
New York, NY, 10001 USA

Twitter: @africamedia_CPJ

Blog: Mohamed Keita
Blog: Tom Rhodes

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