Monday, April 5, 2004
Ah, Uganda's Press: So Free, So Terrorised
Last Wednesday, the Monitor newspaper won another important victory in the Kampala Chief Magistrate's court. The court dismissed a case brought against the paper in October 2002, in which the state claimed that a story alleging a military helicopter had crashed in action against rebels in the north was likely to endanger national security.
The story resulted in a raid by heavily armed security officers on the Monitor's offices, and its closure for 10 days. I was managing editor then, and together with former news editor Wanyama Wangah and reporter Frank Nyakairu, was arrested and dragged to court.
With the Wednesday judgement, we escaped a seven-year prison term. I have lost count of the exact number of times I have been in the dock, beginning in September 1997 when the Monitor reported that Uganda had been compensated in gold for helping Congolese rebels oust the country's dictator, Mobutu Sese Seko.
Adding the appeals in the High Court, Constitutional Court, and Supreme Court, it is well over 120 times! Yet this ordeal can't be understood as martyrdom, or even a brave fight for press freedom. It would be insignificant if that were all there was to it. The real lesson I learnt from years of fighting to stay out of jail was how the African state, in general, exercises political control and gets its citizens to come to terms with repression. One needs to go back 18 years to the time when President Yoweri Museveni's government came to power.
His rule has seen the widest expansion of press freedom, but also the most extensive persecution of journalists. Journalists have been jailed or hauled before courts 10 times more than in the 25 years before 1986.
The effect has been remarkable. Abdi Hussein was arrested with Alfred Okware for asking former Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda embarrassing questions at a press conference. Hussein was so traumatised, his life took a turn that quickly killed him. Okware went into exile into a reclusive life, and died some years later. Jesse Mashate and Festo Ebongu escaped into exile too. The rapidly critical Hassan Njuki was released only so he might die a few hours later.
The dogged Francis Odida's resolve was crushed. He gave his life to God and now has a lucrative ministry. I witnessed the very cerebral George Lugalambi paralysed by fear in court, and become a nervous wreck. Many journalists after a brush with the law gave up journalism altogether.
A handful turned into gun-toting security agents. The list is long. The only journalists who were persecuted and remained active and independent were, interestingly, all from the Monitor. This is because the paper had constructed a philosophy that made suffering at the hands of the state a necessary and inevitable condition of being an independent journalist.
We were more surprised when the government didn't send its officers with handcuffs, than when it did. It was still a normal thing for me, even after I left the Monitor, to casually catch a flight from Nairobi to Kampala to present myself in court with the same ease I did for family reunions.
With the years, I realised that this wasn't a coping mechanism unique to journalists. In general, Ugandans, like most other Africans, used the same method to survive. Governments over the years have jailed or killed critics and activists.
Many caved in. Several fled. The people got scared. To avoid paying the high personal price of confronting a cruel regime, they put their faith in time. With time, the dictator might be toppled in a coup or by rebels, or die of old age. They lowered their expectations and viewed the political failure as intrinsically African.
"What do you expect of an African government?" they asked. Even brave democrats argue for a limit: Don't push the regime too far. People could be killed.The whole country, except the politicians and generals, embrace the gospel of surrender and appeasement.
And the regime lives another day, and another, and another.
Charles Onyango-Obbo is managing editor in charge of media convergence at the Nation Media Group.
E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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