(JED/IFEX) – On 3 February 2004, a court in the capital, Yaounde, found Delor Magellan Kamgaing and Victor Bosco Kelbakal, publication director and reporter/photographer, respectively, with the Yaounde-based weekly “J’informe”, guilty of “defamation”. The journalists each received a suspended three-month prison sentence and were ordered to pay a symbolic 1 CFA franc in damages and […]
(JED/IFEX) – On 3 February 2004, a court in the capital, Yaounde, found Delor Magellan Kamgaing and Victor Bosco Kelbakal, publication director and reporter/photographer, respectively, with the Yaounde-based weekly “J’informe”, guilty of “defamation”. The journalists each received a suspended three-month prison sentence and were ordered to pay a symbolic 1 CFA franc in damages and interest.
The 24 June to 1 July 2003 edition of “J’informe” (issue 14) carried a story by Kelbakal about an alleged affair between Chantal Yologaza, a pastor with the Yaounde-based Réveil Béthel Church (Eglise de Réveil Béthel) and Christian music artist, with a man named Franck Ateba, who was not otherwise identified. On 31 July, Pastor Yologaza filed a complaint against Kamgaing and Kelbakal with a Yaounde court, accusing the journalists of “publishing false news, defamation and insults” against her.
On 2 October, at Yologaza’s request, the newspaper published a correction to the story. The journalists’ sentence follows several months of legal wrangling. Following the announcement of the verdict against the journalists, Kamgaing told JED that he regretted Yologaza’s “bad faith,” since she “never withdrew her complaint, despite the settlement between her and the newspaper.”
