(JED/IFEX) – During the week of 20 to 25 November 2000, Radiotélévision Kin Malebo (RTKM) journalists filed a complaint with the Kinshasa/Gombe Supreme Court (CSJ) against Minister of Communications Dominique Sakombi Inongo. The journalists, who were either fired or refused to work as long as their private station remains under the supervision of the Kinshasa […]
(JED/IFEX) – During the week of 20 to 25 November 2000, Radiotélévision Kin Malebo (RTKM) journalists filed a complaint with the Kinshasa/Gombe Supreme Court (CSJ) against Minister of Communications Dominique Sakombi Inongo. The journalists, who were either fired or refused to work as long as their private station remains under the supervision of the Kinshasa government, accuse Sakombi of “improper expropriation” of RTKM.
According to information received by JED, the CSJ will set a date to hear the case shortly.
On 13 November, the same journalists filed a complaint with the Kinshasa/Gombe High Court against RTKM’s new director, Kasonga Mbunga Kalala Kafumba, for “extortion and attempted extortion”.
JED recalls that, for “political reasons”, the minister of communications recently placed RTKM under state supervision. JED has learned that Laurent-Désiré Kabila’s government justified the decision to nationalise RTKM by explaining that its owner, former Minister of Information Aubain Ngongo Luwowo, allegedly founded the station with funds from the public revenue department. Sakombi subsequently accused Ngongo Luwowo of having “secret relations with the rebellion,” which, over the course of the last two years, has occupied close to half the country.
The private radio and televisionm station RTKM was renamed RTNC 4, as such becoming a member station of Congolese National Radio-television (Radiotélévision nationale congolaise, RTNC, a public station). Minister Sakombi then dismissed RTKM’s directors and named Mbunga as the new director.
