Ethiopia: Released editor calls his detention an“eye-opener”
By Tesfa -alem Tekle
September 4, 2008 (ADDIS ABABA) — The editor of the privately-owned Amharic-language weekly Reporter, Amare Aregawi, After spending six days in a regional state prison, he described his experience to his paper, the reporter as an “eye-opener” to how little attention is being given to the plight of average citizens in different parts of the country.
“The lesson learned from this is that there is more work ahead of us as journalists. People have so much to say about their plight and only because they are far away from the capital and have little or no access to an information outlet, they are forced to accept injustice,” Amare, who is editor of this newspaper and the Amharic Reporter, said.
Amare, who has ran Ethiopia’s public television after the fall of the former Derg dictatorship in 1991,was initially taken by police on Aug 22,2008 from his office in the Addis Ababa headquarters of Media and Communication Centre, a company that owns two well-known weeklies, the Amharic-language Reporter and the English-language The Reporter.
He was arrested In connection with a liable case brought by the Gondar based Dashin brewery. Then later he was transferred to Gondar, a town some 750 kilometers away from the capital where he appeared in court and bailed out later.
It is questionable whether the case warranted his arrest and his transfer to the Amhara Regional State. According to the law, the case is under federal jurisdiction.
“We as media people have limited ourselves to Addis Ababa that we are blind to the suffering and injustice meted out to thousands outside the capital. So many people around the country continue to be subjected to the whims of officials,” Amare said.
Amare later learned that the person whose name is Tewodros was a driver for the Dashen Brewery.
“The police in Gondar were dumbfounded when I spoke of two officers, or made any reference to the second ‘officer who said was in charge of the situation.’ They had only sent one officer to escort me. Upon describing him, they told me that he was a driver of Dashen Brewery.”
The officer who took Amare to Gondar, a sergeant Muktar was also responsible for investigating the case of Teshome Niku, the reporter who wrote the brewery’s labor dispute story.
“People will ask ‘were you harassed? Were you assaulted? None of those things happened. But that is not my standard of justice. I am not going to complain that they did not give me water or that it was cold there and what have you. I am saying that the way the legal process was being handled was all wrong.
“The way the accusation was made, the way I was arrested, how I communicated with the court being prevented from facing the judges, the number of judges who looked at the case, being transported from Addis Ababa to Gondar, and from prison to court, in the accuser’s vehicle. Standing in court where the plaintiff was not present. It was all confusion.”
This is not just an issue of press freedom it is a question of national importance regarding the rule of law, Amare said.
“Here you have living, breathing people who wait outside a prison to bring you food, water and follow up your case. And these are the people who were fired from the brewery. And you have on the other hand those who say that these people do not exist and drag others to court for telling the truth.”
(ST)