The recent imprisonment of six journalists including a nursing mother of eight-month-old baby in the Gambia is indeed a stark reminder to the fact that press freedom is under siege in the tiny West African nation.

On August 6th 2009, a Gambian High Court slammed 4-year-jail term against the journalists after the trial that many people believed was highly influenced by President Yahya Jammeh and his government. The journalists’ only crime was to issue and run a press release that the government argued defamed President Jammeh.

Relations between Gambian government and journalists especially those holding opposing/critical views are not cordial to say the least. President Jammeh and his officials continue to intimidate, harass and persecute such media practitioners leading to climate of fear. Among the many press freedom violations and attacks against journalists are the following:

Unresolved murder cases: The December 2004 cold-blooded murder of Deyda Hydara, the former managing editor of Banjul-based ‘Point’ newspaper, remains unresolved. The killers are still at large and there is yet to be any serious investigations into the matter for over four years now. Another case involving journalist Omar Barrow who was gunned down in April 2000 along with 12 protesting students also remained unresolved.

Disappearance: Chief Ebrima Manneh a reporter with ‘Daily Observer’ newspaper has been missing since July 2006. Rights groups said he was kidnapped by agents of Gambia?s notorious National Intelligence Agency (NIA).

Wrongful arrests/detentions: These are now part of the daily struggle for journalists in the Gambia. Scores of them have been arrested, detained and in many cases subjected to torture and degrading conditions. Among those recently arrested and detained are – Pap Saine, (Managing editor) and Modou Sanyang, (senior reporter) of ‘Point newspaper’ as well as Halifa Sallah, of privately-owned ‘Foroyaa’ newspaper.

Exiled Journalists: Many journalists including the author of this report have been forced into exile. In July 2007, I was chased and harassed by agents of Gambia’s notorious National Intelligence Agency (NIA) forcing me to flee my home country and thereby joining a long list of Gambian exiled journalists. As a journalist in exile some of us have faced many problems such as lack of security /protection, the risk of being pursued by government agents, as well as all sorts of family problems resulting from disconnect

What the Commonwealth should do: I expect and call on the Commonwealth to do more by intervening in the unfortunate Gambian situation with a view to getting government change its negative attitude and policies towards the media. Commonwealth should further assist in getting Gambian authorities respect press freedom and human rights in general as well as find ways of assisting the many journalists who have been forced into exiled and are suffering as a result of their work and belief in press freedom and freedom of expression in general.

Kaye Whiteman, a writer and journalist and former Director of Information at the Commonwealth Secretariat says more needs to be done to prevent abuse of media freedoms in the Commonwealth.

Following on my ‘starter’ on July 30, let me go into greater detail on the matter of freedom of expression, one area in which the Commonwealth could engage to sharpen its somewhat bland image. I am aware that, for an organisation which is an association of states, and therefore of governments, this poses a number of problems, but we also have to be mindful that it is a ‘Commonwealth of peoples’.

The Commonwealth played an exceptional role in furthering the political emancipation of both Zimbabwe and South Africa in the last quarter of the 20th century, which highlighted its unique qualities and potential as an international agent of freedom. It was a role that led directly to the Harare Declaration of 1991 on democracy and human rights: the fine words on Southern Africa had to have a more universal application if the Commonwealth was to continue to be taken seriously.

This manifesto was honed and developed into direct action with the 1995 crisis over Nigeria and the Saro Wiwa execution, which coincided with the Auckland CHOGM and the Millbrook Declaration that set up the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group (CMAG). Some see this as the single most important political function the organisation has at the moment, giving some measure of teeth to Commonwealth activity, normally only influence-based. CMAG has, after some early successes in its positions against illegal governments and military regimes, shown contradictions and limitations, in the face of serious abuses by civilian administrations.

This was what led to the inclusion in the Coolum Declaration (2002) of a commitment to ‘freedom of expression’ as a human right. In pursuit of the recommendations of the High Level Review Report Of that year, Coolum tried to set out a ‘clear set of procedures’ for the Secretary-General and the Chairperson in Office under which CMAG can address ?serious or persistent? violations of the Harare Principles, going beyond the unconstitutional overthrow of member governments. But although we are told issues affecting non-military regimes have been sometimes discussed informally, or ‘below the line’, or in connection with the increasingly important ‘good offices’ function of the Secretary-General, the Coolum procedures have not yet been officially invoked. The concentration of CMAG of late has been more on the cases of Pakistan and Fiji.

There may well now be a case for reviving the Secretariat-generated idea of a more comprehensive reinforced mandate for CMAG to cover certain serious shortcomings of non-military governments that had been aired in 1999, but were rejected at the Durban CHOGM. Too many governments felt affected to be comfortable with such a mandate extension.

The 1999 proposals included, significantly, the banning of opposition media as a legitimate subject for consideration by CMAG ministers, although at that stage the Commonwealth had still to embrace freedom of expression. While a clearly identified pillar of democracy, media freedom is often downplayed because of the nervousness it engenders. After Coolum, the Abuja Declaration of Democracy of 2003 also included among democratic objectives ‘the right to information’, but it seems that the issue of the media is a sleeping dog that many would prefer to let lie.

The case for pressing the matter rests on evidence that the situation of independent media in a number of Commonwealth countries is deteriorating, without the organisation itself paying much interest. It has often been left to outfits like Reporters Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Journalists to mobilise international campaigns, especially in countries where the murder of journalists has gone unpunished, like Sri Lanka and the Gambia. The Commonwealth Journalists Association and the Commonwealth Press Union (now being reconstituted as the Commonwealth Press Union Media Trust) do, however, have an honourable record of protesting without making an impact on the Commonwealth as a whole.

How can this be done ‘While it hard for the Commonwealth to promote the idea of journalists as ‘human rights defenders’, if you are going to have a democracy, the media must, for better or worse, be allowed to do their work free from intimidation and fear. On the one hand, in the Coolum procedures, the organisation already has the means to raise the issue, should there be the political will. On the other hand, a more frontal approach, mobilising all Commonwealth media and human rights organisations, with significant and soberly collated evidence of abuses, and perhaps using the Commonwealth Peoples’ Forum prior to the Trinidad CHOGM as a spearhead, could be worth trying in the hope of arousing opinion.

The recent condemnation by Secretary-General Sharma of press censorship by the military regime in Fiji (prior to its suspension) marked a small but welcome breakthrough on this subject, highlighting an issue that the Commonwealth, whatever the difficulties, has an obligation to confront.

Kaye Whiteman
Writer and journalist: Former Director of Information, Commonwealth secretariat; currently a Committee Member, Commonwealth Journalists Association, UK Branch.