Ghana / Africa

  

Faces of impunity across the world

CPJ’s 2023 Global Impunity Index lists the top 12 countries where the murderers of journalists go free. But impunity knows no borders. The mosaic below shows the faces of slain journalists around the world. Beneath each journalist’s photo is the location of their death. Click the images for more details about these unsolved cases. (Photo grid by Geoff McGhee)

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Kamilu Ibrahim Tahidu, a brother of slain journalist Ahmed Hussien-Suale Divela, sits outside their family home in Accra, Ghana. (Photo: Jonathan Rozen/CPJ)

‘You better shut up’: A Ghana family’s relentless calls for justice

Kamilu Ibrahim Tahidu and his brothers gather every evening outside their family home in Ghana’s capital of Accra. They sit in a circle of plastic chairs and enjoy each others’ company. They pray together. And they never forget that one of them is missing. It’s been over four years since assassins came to their neighborhood,…

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Four years since murder of Ahmed Hussein-Suale Divela, Ghana’s journalists still attacked with impunity

The January 16, 2019, murder of Ghanaian journalist Ahmed Hussein-Suale Divela, who was gunned down by unidentified men months after threats by a local politician, sent shockwaves through the country’s press corps and yielded promises from leaders to find the killers and bring them to justice. But four years later – despite police assurances of progress and two arrests – nobody has been…

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How U.S. copyright law and fake Gmail accounts were used to censor a report on gambling in Kenya

On February 4, Emmanuel Dogbevi turned to Twitter with a plea for help. He tagged press freedom groups and colleagues in a series of tweets, lamenting how allegations that he violated U.S. copyright law had prompted his news website to be taken offline.  Dogbevi told CPJ via phone that Ghana Business News, the Ghana-based website he edits,…

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Ghana police officials receive technology

US, UK, Interpol give Ghana phone hacking tools, raising journalist concerns on safety and confidentiality

In May 2019, senior members of Ghana’s law enforcement posed for photos with the U.S. ambassador to their country at a ceremony in the capital, Accra. Between them they held boxes and bags, gifts from the U.S. government to Ghana which, according to one of the recipients, contained Israeli phone hacking technology. That recipient was…

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The Independence Arch is pictured in Accra, Ghana. Authorities have failed to hold anyone to account in recent attacks on journalists. (CPJ/Jonathan Rozen)

Ghana won’t have press freedom without accountability

Three bullets, fired at close range by two assassins on a black and blue Boxer motorbike on January 16, 2019, killed investigative journalist Ahmed Hussein-Suale Divela, according to Sammy Darko, a lawyer working on Divela’s case. Darko told CPJ over the phone that bystanders saw it happen. Ghana’s media community, international rights groups (including CPJ),…

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Ghana should review information access bill

An access to information bill currently under consideration in Ghana will do more harm than good, according to the Coalition on the Right to Information in Ghana, which has called for a review of the proposed legislation. 

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Monitor reporter Angelo Izama, right, went through the courts to gain access to government documents and was denied. (Monitor)

Freedom of information laws struggle to take hold in Africa

In Uganda, a ruling this week in a landmark case of two journalists seeking to compel their government’s disclosure of multinationals oil deals highlighted the challenges to public transparency just before media leaders, press freedom advocates, officials, and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter gather in Ghana next week at the African Regional Conference on the Right…

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CPJ

For investigative reporters, many risks and some answers

Reporters who dig up carefully buried facts about those in power can easily find themselves in danger. In countries where a tradition of watchdog journalism has not yet taken hold, the risks of practicing investigative reporting can be real and physical for those reporters that take it on.

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