RSF's open letter to Prime Minister Abdelmadjid Tebboune on the situation of press freedom in Algeria

Prime Minister Abdelmadjid Tebboune

Government Palace

Rue Docteur Saâdane

1600 Algiers

Tunis, 22 June 2017

Dear Prime Minister,

Since 2014, Algeria has fallen more than ten places in the World Press Freedom Index that is compiled by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and is ranked 134th in the 2017 Index. Last year, 2016, was a tragic one for the Algerian media, especially with the death in prison on 11 December of Mohamed Tamalt, a citizen-journalist convicted of “insulting state authority” for comments posted on Facebook. No investigation has been conducted into the circumstances of his death, leaving the family helpless, without any kind of explanation from the prison authorities.

That tragic death was compounded by the imprisonment in June of two professional journalists, Mehdi Benaissa and Ryad Hartouf, and the imprisonment in November of Hassan Bouras, a blogger convicted of contempt of court, insult and defamation. These three men were released after long periods of completely arbitrary provisional detention that violated the code of criminal procedure as amended in 2015.

The common feature of these judicial proceedings was that they were brought under the criminal code, which is still being used to prosecute journalists on charges of defamation, contempt and insult. This code needs to be amended in order to finally ensure that media offences are no longer punishable by imprisonment, in accordance with the Algerian constitution and Algeria’s international obligations as regards freedom of information and freedom of the press.

On behalf of RSF, an NGO that defends media freedom and has consultative status with the United Nations, UNESCO, the Council of Europe and the International Organization of the Francophonie (OIF), I would like to use the occasion of your assumption of office on 24 May to present our main recommendations on media freedom in Algeria to you.

RSF is also concerned about the fate of privately-owned broadcast media which, when they are critical, find themselves almost systematically harassed and even closed without any consultation with the regulatory body. In 2015, for example, the Algerian government ordered the closure of two TV channels (El Atlas TV and El Watan TV). In 2016, a judicial action by the ministry of communication resulted in the cancellation of the sale of the Arabic-language media group El Khabar to Ness Prod, a subsidiary of Cevital, a company owned by the businessman Issaad Rebrab.

Around 50 TV channels broadcast from abroad because they lack licences. RSF recommends that the Algerian government should encourage the regulation of this sector using the Broadcasting Regulation Authority (ARAV), an entity whose financial autonomy and independence must be maintained, especially as regards the granting of licences to TV channels.

In its report entitled “Algeria, the invisible hand of power over the media,” published in December 2016, RSF noted that the Algerian authorities used the public printing presses and the advertising allocated by the state agency ANEP as means of pressure. These public entities should review the criteria for allocating state advertising and the payment schedules that the printing presses impose on newspapers in a summary fashion.

Finally, RSF is concerned about the threats made by senior officials against journalists, as in April 2017 in the run-up to the parliamentary elections, and the publication of directives imposing restrictions on the media. Several journalists and media outlets have expressed their concern to RSF about the increasing frequency with which they are censored on the Internet. We consider it essential that the freedom of journalists and the media to provide information on the Internet should be respected in accordance with article 50 of the March 2016 constitution, which says the freedom of the print, broadcast and online media is guaranteed, without any form of prior censorship.

I thank you in advance for the attention you give to this letter.

Sincerely,

Christophe Deloire

Secretary-General