South Sudan President Salva Kiir. South
Sudan is a country with no media law, making it difficult for reporters
to get information as the government and security services are mainly
made up of ex-guerrillas. (Reuters)
By CARL ODERA AND ULF LAESSING, REUTERS / JUBA
South Sudan has arrested two state broadcast journalists for failing to
ensure coverage of a crucial speech by President Salva Kiir, a
government official said on Sunday, prompting an outcry from an
international media watchdog.
Journalists often complain of persecution by the security services of
the African republic that seceded from Sudan in 2011. That year, Juba
authorities closed a newspaper after it criticized Kiir for allowing his
daughter to marry a foreigner.
The government of South Sudan’s Western Bahr El Ghazal state said it had
detained two senior staff at its broadcaster for “administrative
issues” after the station failed to cover Kiir’s visit to the town of
Wau last month.
“They were arrested simply because when the president arrived here in
Wau on December 22, 2012, he gave a very, very important speech,” state
information minister Derrick Alfred Uya told Reuters.
The Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based media watchdog,
named the detained pair as Louis Pasquale, director-general of the state
broadcaster in Western Bahr el Ghazal, and Ashab Khamis, director of
state television.
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