(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has written to Alex Rono, head of the North-Eastern Provincial Police, calling on him to reverse an order for the arrest of Victore Obure, the Garissa correspondent for the “East African Standard” newspaper. “He is a journalist who is simply carrying out his work. There can be no justification for ordering his […]
(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has written to Alex Rono, head of the North-Eastern Provincial Police, calling on him to reverse an order for the arrest of Victore Obure, the Garissa correspondent for the “East African Standard” newspaper. “He is a journalist who is simply carrying out his work. There can be no justification for ordering his arrest,” said RSF Secretary-General Robert Ménard. “The fact that he has gone underground is a very alarming sign of the treatment meted out to journalists who are detained by the police. Yet, in December 2000, Rono said that measures would be taken to ‘harmonise the relationship between the police and journalists.'”
RSF has learned that Obure decided to go underground because of fears for his safety. According to police sources, the Criminal Investigation Department called for his arrest during the week of 15 April 2002, following the publication of an article which reported on the police’s extortion of thousands of Kenyan shillings from citizens of Garissa during a crackdown on illegal immigrants in the city.
RSF also recalled that on 22 March, “The People Daily” newspaper and its former editor-in-chief, George Mbugguss, were ordered to pay 20 million Kenyan shillings (approx. US$255,650; 300,000 euros) to Minister for Trade and the Interior Nicholas Biwott for “libel”. “The secret history of Moi-Nyache”, an article published on 10 March 1999, claimed that Biwott, then minister for the Eastern African Community, was involved in the controversial awarding of a tender for the construction of a hydro-electric dam. The newspaper claimed that the “Turkwell Gorge” project was awarded to a French company under dubious circumstances (see IFEX alerts of 25 March 2002 and 8 August 2000).
