Issues at stake: Cameroon’s free press in handcuffs

The press is totally free in Cameroon, only in the figment of the imagination of Government propaganda megaphones.

From every indication, journalists in Cameroon are born free, but everywhere they are in chains. Media watchdogs like ‘Reporters sans Frontiers’, Committee to Protect Journalists, as well as Freedom House, have corroborated this observation in very vehement terms.

But on World Press Freedom Day, May 3, the establishment chose to be very frugal with the truth on these issues. They were very generous with the verbal alchemy on the matter. The Minister of Communication, Issa Tchiroma Bakery, brandished the glittering externalities of the media landscape in the country to drive home his claim that the press is free in Cameroon. He painted a media paradise of 600 newspapers, 150 commercial radio stations, and over 20 Television channels.

This setting, he went on, was born out of the 1990 Law on Mass Communication that ushered in a new lease of freedom. Such a superficial view is a fallacy that is likely to subvert the core of genuine probing on media freedom.

Tchiroma’s declarations could be true in a country where fiction is truer than reality. It could also be true for a country which is constantly in motion, whereas there is no movement. Yet, the stubborn reality is that the country’s legal framework does not expressly guarantee press freedom. The criminal defamation provision that journalists are still grappling with, is an affront to press freedom.

The Penal Code and the law on terrorism hang on journalists like the Sword of Damocles. Besides, the Cameroonian press is a manipulated and emasculated press. A majority of the news organs are owned by people in the establishment. They have rented mercenaries who pass around for publishers and journalists. Such pipsqueaks are virtually at their beck and call.

A manipulated and emasculated press cannot be free in anyway. There are pieces of legislation that smear press freedom in all ramifications. That is why a judge in Kumba recently ordered the detention of two journalists for the simple reason that they were listening to court proceedings. The two journalists, Marcel Fokwen of The Post and Jude Njinjuh of Eden, were reportedly standing outside the courtroom listening to proceedings when they were arrested.

That was not an isolated incident. The fact that CRTV journalist, Julius Teke, was bundled into detention in Limbe, recently, is a sign that the New Deal Regime is still very primitive. Journalists in the West Region have cried out against harassment by security and administrative officials. It happens all over the country.

If Government had the political will to promote freedom of the press, it would have, like the United States, pledged its commitment in the Constitution. The US Constitution states clearly that Congress shall enact no laws abridging freedom of the press. In such a situation, anybody who attempts passing any anti-press freedom law takes the risk of violating the fundamental law of the land. Our Constitution does not guarantee the promotion and protection of press freedom in anyway.

What Government can take credit for is the double-edge sword element of benign tolerance. This benign tolerance creates an atmosphere of fear and forces the press to self-regulate to the extent of surrendering its independence to the powers-that-be. A manipulated and too much self-regulated press becomes timid and intimidated and reduced to a toy in the hands of the obscenely mighty of the society.

The press that got its original moorings from the ancient Roman Empire has always enjoyed a love-hate ambivalence relationship with those in power. From when Julius Caesar started writing the “Acta Diurnal” (Daily Events), the struggle between the people’s right to know and Government’s might to hide information started. Great politicians over the world have always had a comment or two about the press.

In his letter to Col. Edward Carrington, Thomas Jefferson wrote: “Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a Government without newspapers or newspapers without a Government, I should not hesitate to prefer the latter.” But 20 years later, President Jefferson came down hard on the press. In another letter to John Norvell, he said those who were not reading newspapers were more informed than those who were reading them because journalists were feeding them with half truths and outright lies.

Even before the Watergate Scandal forced him to quit the stage on a dirty slate, the 37th President of the United States, Richard Nixon, had described journalists with disdain as a “tiny fraternity of privileged men elected by no one.”

The former French ruler, Napoleon Bonarparte, said he feared the press more than a thousand bayonets. The former Nigerian strongman, Shehu Shagari, joined the party by saying that he stopped reading newspapers in order to have a peace of mind. These statements by emblematic world political figures at the time are a glaring testimony that the relationship between true journalists and politicians has never been always smooth.

The case of Cameroon remains an enigma. President Biya has never unveiled the opinion he holds about the Cameroonian press. During the upsurge of the “homosexuality scandals” some years back, President Biya was quick to accuse journalists of prying into people’s private lives. He made the statement during one of his speeches and ended there.

Since he came to power in 1982, Biya has never granted a press conference to local press. Small wonder that some critical observers now hold that our President’s charity, as far as talking to the press is concerned, begins abroad. He usually chooses the French media, notably Radio Monte Carlo and France 24 to make revealing statements that border on Cameroon’s political life.

Freedom of access to sources of information to the Cameroonian journalists remains a nightmare. Here, journalists are not allowed to freely cover the Presidency, the Prime Minister’s Office and a few other State institutions. When the authorities occasionally invite journalists to cover certain events, they consider it a favour. This explains why journalists are clamouring for the enactment of an information act. Such a law should compel public authorities to give out information to journalists when they need it.

Authorities often treat journalists who are looking for information as if they were enemies of the Republic. Yet the press is an important development partner in every nation. Countries that have real press freedom have rapidly advanced in democracy and socio-economic development. An unfettered press instills checks and balances in the country; compelling people in authority to be accountable to the people they govern.

It plays the watchdog for better governance. So, why not give reasonable subvention to the Cameroonian press, instead of aid whose delivery is mired in corruption? Why are the recommendations of the 2012 Communication Forum still lying fallow in the cupboards of Government officials? Who does not want an unfettered, free and vibrant press in Cameroon?