(IFJ/IFEX) – The following is a 12 March 2002 IFJ media release: Journalists Accuse Morocco Over “Cynical and Unjust” Sacking of Union Leader In Press Code Battle The world’s largest journalist’s group today condemned the ruling party of Moroccan Prime Minister Abderrahman Yusufi over the “cynical and unjustified attack on a courageous union leader.” The […]
(IFJ/IFEX) – The following is a 12 March 2002 IFJ media release:
Journalists Accuse Morocco Over “Cynical and Unjust” Sacking of Union Leader In Press Code Battle
The world’s largest journalist’s group today condemned the ruling party of Moroccan Prime Minister Abderrahman Yusufi over the “cynical and unjustified attack on a courageous union leader.”
The protest follows the suspension without pay of Younes Mjahed, an elected member of the International Federation of Journalist’s governing body and General Secretary of the Moroccan National Union of Journalists, from his position as a journalist with the newspaper Ittihad Ishtiraki.
“The decision to remove Younes Mjahed is shocking victimisation of a union leader over his role in articulating the challenge of his union against the government’s plans to reform the press code,” said Aidan White, IFJ General Secretary. “This is a politically motivated act of unfair dismissal that is outside Moroccan law. We shall fight it all the way.”
The Minister of Culture and Communication, Mohamed Achaari, is the director of Ittihad Ishtiraki. He has published an attack on critics of the government’s plans to revamp the press code, highlighting the role of the Moroccan union.
IFJ leaders, meeting in Brussels on the weekend, agreed that the Federation’s members around the world should be asked to protest over the removal of Younes Mjahed, whose union is launching a legal action over the case.
The IFJ has written to the Prime Minister of Morocco calling for Younes Mjahed to be reinstated in his position and for Morocco to “fully recognise the right of trade unionists and journalists to exercise their right to protest, to represent their members’ views and to do so without fear of victimisation.”
The IFJ is the world’s largest journalists’ group with 500,000 members in 106 countries.
