Burundi 'playing with fire'
2006-09-29 09:20
Nairobi - The head of a private radio
station in Burundi has gone into hiding after intimidation from
a government increasingly accused of suppressing freedom of
expression, an international media watchdog has said.
The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said
Alexis Sinduhije, who runs Radio Publique Africaine (RPA), was
on the run after a minister linked his station to one in
neighbouring Rwanda notorious for inciting the genocide in 1994.
"The government of Burundi is playing with fire by invoking
the spectre of genocide to intimidate a highly respected radio
station whose programmes have helped the nation heal its ethnic
divisions," said the Committee's executive director Joel Simon.
"We call on the government to publicly express its support
for RPA, guarantee the safety of its employees, and refrain from
making inflammatory statements," he added.
The Committee quoted Burundi's Communications Minister
Ramadhani Karenga as saying Sinduhije's station was "like RTLM".
That was a reference to Radio Television Libre des Mille
Collines which broadcast exhortations to exterminate
"cockroaches" prior to the slaughter of 800 000 Rwandan Tutsis and moderate Hutus.
Sinduhije won the Committee to Protect Journalist's (CPJ)
press freedom award in 2004.
"He has now gone into hiding for the second time in less
than two months, fearing for his safety," the group said.
"CPJ sources in Bujumbura confirmed that RPA had been
subject to intimidation and harassment, and that government
officials had accused the station of working for the
opposition."
Officials in President Pierre Nkurunziza's government were
not immediately available for comment.
Nkurunziza won elections a year ago at the culmination of a
UN-backed peace process intended to put an end to ethnic
strife that killed some 300 000 people since 1993.
Initially hailed as an African success story, his
administration is now under fire from critics over a crackdown
on political opponents, activists and journalists.