“I’m not radical, I’m flexible”

Q: Mr. Bol, recently Atem Yaak Atem, the Deputy Minister of Information and Broadcasting, said: One of the important aspects of the struggle was to establish a better society where there is justice, equality and freedom of expression.” Has press freedom improved since independence?

A: If you have observed the cases of journalists who have been beaten, arrested, harassed and humiliated since independence, it is clear that we are heading for the worst. We cannot say that there is press freedom when we do not have a legal instrument or a law that regulates it.

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Q: The South Sudanese Information Minister, Barnaba Marial Benjamin, described the media environment in South Sudan as hostile and dangerous,” due to the absence of the legal framework you mentioned. The media bills have been passed by the National Council of Ministers and await legislation by the National Parliament. Why did the president order the withdrawal of the bills?

A: The intention was to allow stakeholders to participate. But until today, the stakeholders, especially the media, say they have not been consulted and their views have not been taken into consideration.

Read also the interview with Mahjoub Mohamed Salih about the situation of the press in Sudan: We fight for the impossible”
 

Q: But the Minister of Information and Broadcasting said during the commemoration of this year’s World Press Day that these laws were withdrawn from parliament at the request of some media activists and that consultations about the laws were being held?

A: As far as I know, the directors of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and the directors of the Ministry of Telecommunication and Postal Services were the ones who discussed our draft bills and we were not consulted. I protested this. Even if these laws are proper and up to international standards, press freedom will be limited. It should have been a package of bills that relate to civil rights in general, but media bills without civil rights laws will prolong the current crisis.

The printing press of The Citizen in Juba, July 2011 - Photo by Gregg Carlstrom

Q: What are the most pressing challenges that the independent media is facing as a result of the current situation?

A: The security people have been calling us about stories they do not want published — that we should not touch the president and his personal life for example. We invite them to sit down and interact but they do not turn up, so they are exercising indirect censorship.

Q: South Sudan has media umbrella institutions, such as the Association for Media Development in South Sudan (AMDISS) and the Union of Journalists of South Sudan (UJOSS). To what extent do these umbrella institutions get involved in mitigating challenges affecting the independent media in South Sudan?

A: All these organisations have been trying to push for the passage of the media bills, but now they are relaxing and have become umbrellas for creating jobs. I do not think they are doing anything to benefit the media houses. Journalists are arrested and the Union of Journalists cannot even issue a single statement. The chairman is operating in a hotel, unable to establish the union in a place accessible to other colleagues. In most cases they have not even discussed the issues facing the journalists. AMDISS is an organisation formed to deal with media development, so they do not directly intervene in these issues.

For more background information on the history of South Sudan's press get a free download of MICT's study "The Sudanese press after separation" - Photo: The Messenger,  February 15, 1959 (Reproduced by permission of Durham University Library)

Q: You are someone who is always radical, especially in your column Straight Talk”. How many times have you been arrested by security organs since independence?

A: I think all the arrests were not by the security but by the police over petty issues. So it is not a matter of radicalism, it is rather an issue of the absence of a transparent system. We have gone to court many times and I can assure you that there is no single case where we have been implicated, apart from one, which we appealed. That was the one of the Secretary General of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), blaming us for attending a press conference without crosschecking with the Secretary General. Ethically, the court decision was unfair because it was a public press conference in a public place. I’m not radical, I’m flexible. Things are going wrong and the authorities do not want people to talk about it.

Q: What measures would you take in order to improve press freedom in South Sudan?

A: If you want to be free you must know your rights. Yet if you go around the media houses, some of the journalists are very irresponsible and they do not practice ethical journalism. Ethics mean we have to be responsible. Sometimes we make mistakes, which provides chances for the authorities to interfere in our role. I just think we need a lot of journalism training. The government is only taking advantage of our ignorance and for that, I do not blame them. Journalists share the blame.

Nhial Bol Aken, Managing Director of Citizen Publications Limited and Editor-In-Chief of The Citizen newspaper, is one of the most prominent journalists in Juba. Outspoken, yet fair-minded, Nhial often gets into trouble for his column ‘Straight Talk’, highlighting the state of corruption and intimidation in South Sudan, as the slogan of The Citizen, Fighting corruption and dictatorship everyday”, claims. These are the two biggest problems in South Sudan,” Nhial says. The high level of corruption will lead to insecurity one day.” The Citizen, which opened its Juba office in 2006, has the highest circulation among all newspapers in South Sudan and it is the only newspaper in the country with its own printing press.