McClatchy's Boswell caught in South Sudan's war of words
By <
http://www.cpj.org/blog/author/tom-rhodes> Tom Rhodes/CPJ East Africa
Consultant
August 22, 2012 5:19 PM ET |
A day before U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton visited South
Sudan this month, <
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/> McClatchy correspondent
Alan Boswell
<
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/08/02/159535/clinton-visit-to-south-sudan-c
olored.html> reported that President Salva Kiir had finally acknowledged his
government's support for a Nuba Mountains-based group that had been
skirmishing with Sudanese forces. In a letter to his U.S. counterpart, the
story said, Kiir apologized for his previous denials, which came in the face
of U.S. intelligence to the contrary. The story, which exposed an important
element in the tense relations between the two once-joined nations, put
Boswell in the cross-hairs.
Two days later, Information Minister Barnaba Marial accused Boswell in a
<
http://www.sudanradio.org/barnaba-refutes-apology-letter-report-accuses-int
ernational-reporter> radio interview of being paid by the Sudanese
government to tarnish Africa's newest government. "This is a guy who is
completely in the pay of Khartoum," the minister said in a
<
http://www.sudanradio.org/> Sudan Radio Service interview. "It is not true
what he is writing. He has never written anything in favor of South Sudan."
Worse, Marial convened a press conference in Juba the next day, distributing
a statement that denied the story and slammed Boswell as "an enemy of
peace."
Boswell's prolific reporting on Sudan and South Sudan belies the minister's
accusations. Since January, Boswell had been writing about the
<
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/06/19/v-print/153373/thousands-flee-sudanes
e-armys.html> atrocities committed by the Sudanese army in the Nuba
Mountains region of Blue Nile State, citing Sudanese President Omar Bashir's
<
http://world.time.com/2012/06/28/sudans-blue-nile-offensive-is-this-the-nex
t-darfur/> human rights record as "one of the worst in the world"--hardly
propaganda for Khartoum. "It is a completely baseless charge, and the
government [of South Sudan] knows that," Boswell responded in a
<
http://www.sudanradio.org/alan-boswell-reacts?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_me
dium=twitter> radio interview. "No U.S. official contradicted my reporting
or demanded a retraction, and no representative of the South Sudanese
government has contacted either me or my newspaper company with information
to contradict what I reported."
In the violent context of Sudanese-South Sudanese relations, public
accusations from a senior government official can endanger a journalist's
life. "I'm sure I needn't tell you that among many of your countrymen, being
'completely in the pay of Khartoum' is tantamount to an accusation of being
a spy for the enemy," McClatchy President and CEO Patrick Talamantes wrote
to the minister. "Suggesting that Mr. Boswell is in the pay of the enemy
risks his physical well-being, as you surely knew when you selected that
phrase and then made certain it was distributed widely."
Tensions between South Sudan and Sudan, which separated in July 2011, are
rife to the point where both sides
<
http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/sudan-very-optimistic-about-border-agree
ment-with-ssudan> nearly warred in April over border and resource disputes,
according to local journalists and news
<
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/so
uth-sudan/index.html> reports. The reactionary and often violent
<
http://www.cpj.org/blog/2011/09/south-sudans-struggle-for-a-free-press.php>
security forces in South Sudan make the minister's comments particularly
reckless.
Marial replied to the McClatchy letter last week, offering to meet Boswell
but sticking to his unjustified assertions. "We have noted the continuous
negative campaign in which Mr. Alan Boswell has been targeting the people
and the Republic of South Sudan in all his articles that reflect a
pro-Khartoum campaign," he
<
http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article43535> wrote to the McClatchy
newspaper company.
Facing continuing pressure from McClatchy and others, Marial finally wrote a
<
http://www.catholicradionetwork.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=artic
le&id=7581%3Ainformation-minister-retracts-charges-against-expat-journalist&
catid=2%3Asouth-sudan&Itemid=84> retraction "for the sake of understanding
and harmony" and welcomed Boswell to continue reporting in Sudan. The
minister's admission constitutes a victory for press freedom in South Sudan.
But what about local journalists who do not have the backing of strong media
companies to clear their names?
Take Bonifacio Taban, a correspondent for the news website
<
http://www.sudantribune.com/index.php> Sudan Tribune who works in the
restive Unity State where sporadic conflicts between Sudanese and South
Sudanese forces are common. "Our leaders in South Sudan react like that
whenever journalists in South Sudan write a critical article about their
leadership," Taban told me in reaction to the accusations against Boswell. A
senior South Sudan army commander detained Taban in June, accusing him of
being a "Khartoum agent" for an article he wrote about widows of the former
southern rebels with the Sudan People's Liberation Army. "He told me he
could do away with me and no one would do anything to him," the journalist
said. Taban's article, "Over 500 SPLA widows complain of ill-treatment,"
angered the military because the figure suggested more soldiers had died in
recent border conflicts than the southern army had acknowledged. Further,
some of the widows Taban interviewed complained of not receiving proper
compensation for the death of their husbands, according to local journalists
and <
http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article42793> reports.
Fortunately for Taban, the South Sudanese officer eventually let him go
without charge.
Nonetheless, the fear of being labeled by authorities as a supporter of
Sudan is enough to make many South Sudanese journalists hesitant to report
freely. Part of the problem lies in the way that South Sudanese journalists
reported news during the civil war. As Alfred Taban, a veteran journalist
and founder of
<
http://www.thecitizen.info/society/juba-monitor-newspaper-to-launch-late-au
gust/> The Juba Monitor, told me last year, "The [South Sudanese] press is
partly to blame. During the war, the southern press acted almost entirely as
an opposing voice to the Khartoum government." Today, the South Sudanese
press has recognized that the war is over and its role must change. Despite
growing evidence of widespread government
<
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-18421763> corruption, South Sudan's
leaders expect the press to blindly support them. Perhaps Boswell's case
will serve as a reminder that the times have changed and that a vibrant,
critical press is one of the fruits of peace.
http://www.cpj.org/mt-static/support/assets_c/userpics/userpic-50-100x100.pn
g
Tom Rhodes is CPJ's <
http://cpj.org/africa/> East Africa consultant, based
in Nairobi. Rhodes is a founder of southern Sudan's first independent
newspaper. Follow him on Twitter: _at_africamedia_CPJ
<
http://twitter.com/africamedia_CPJ>
------------[ Sent via the dehai-wn mailing list by dehai.org]--------------
Received on Wed Aug 22 2012 - 15:15:35 EDT
