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'Africa needs press freedom'
04/06/2007 17:08 - (SA)
Cape Town - The absence of press freedom in many African countries inhibits development on the continent and deprives millions of Africans of their rights, World Association of Newspapers (WAN) President Gavin O'Reilly said on Monday.
"Political transformation has been deeply flawed, if not stillborn, in dozens of African nations, because of the failure to secure one of the absolutely fundamental conditions for full, living democracy and pluralism," he told delegates to the 60th World Newspaper Congress and 14th World Editors' Forum.
"I'm talking, of course, about freedom of the press, which continues to be violated on a daily basis across the length and breadth of this continent.
"This freedom, whose defence and promotion was set by the founding fathers of WAN as our first and over-riding mission, is not only a human right to which every African man and woman is entitled, but a pre-condition for the establishment of good governance and durable economic, political, social and cultural development," he said.
"It is also, I would contend, a powerful tool in the fight against corruption, famine, poverty, violent conflict, disease and lack of education - afflictions of which African peoples have much more than their fair share."
Harassment must stop
The daily persecution and harassment of the free press had to stop, but press freedom also had to be much higher on the agenda of African development proposals and programmes.
O'Reilly paid tribute to journalists in Africa for the "treasures of imagination, courage and resilience" they demonstrated daily in bringing out their publications, often under difficult conditions, and so playing their role in keeping democratic debate alive.
The meeting, the first of the world's press in Africa, marked the occasion with the Declaration of Table Mountain.
The declaration calls on African states to recognise the indivisibility of press freedom and to respect their commitments to international and African protocols upholding this freedom and independence.
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