Newspaper editor to defy closure order

A Kinshasa newspaper has been ordered to shut down after it published an article criticising the Zimbabwean army. Officially the newspaper, ‘Libre Afrique’, was suspended because it had not notified the government of its address, but editor Freddy Loseke told IRIN this was “just a pretext”.

The suspension order was announced at the weekend, shortly after the
newspaper came out with an editorial criticising Zimbabwean troops - allies of the Kinshasa government - for spreading AIDS and failing to recapture any of the Congo’s territory, sources in Kinshasa said.

An assistant to the officer handling Zimbabwe’s military PR in Congo, Major
Makotori, said he had “heard about the story”. “We handed the matter to the ministry of information,” he said.
However DRC Information Minister Kikaya Bin Karubi denied that he had acted under pressure from Zimbabwe.

The editorial in ‘Libre Afrique’ claimed that the Zimbabwean troops in Congo typically have three or four local girlfriends and are a “severe AIDS risk”.

It also pointed out that their pay, US $20 a day, is ten times as much as
Congolese soldiers are paid.

“Air Zimbabwe is getting free petrol from a DRC company and Harare has been granted huge mineral concessions,” the editorial said. “Since the Zimbabweans came to Congo they have not recaptured a single village...so why do they have to stay here?”

Loseke said he was not taking any notice of the ban on ‘Libre Afrique’.
“We’re reprinting the entire article,” he added.

‘Libre Afrique’ is the first newspaper to be suspended in government-controlled territory since the inauguration of Joseph Kabila as president in January.

Observers noted it was very rare for newspapers in the DRC to be suspended over the past three years, but editors and journalists have frequently been harassed and last year Loseke was sentenced to four years in jail. He was freed under an amnesty.