Freed journalist hopes his prison spell can bring about change

Newly-freed newspaper editor Madiambal Diagne has said he hopes his two-week spell in prison will bring about changes to media laws in Senegal, whose reputation as a haven of democracy in West Africa has been dented by the episode. Diagne, the editor of independent newspaper Le Quotidien, was jailed on 9 July after he published articles about alleged fraud in the customs service and alleged government interference in the judiciary. His incarceration, described by international media watchdog Reporters Sans Frontieres as "new proof of the hardening of the State", prompted an immediate 24-hour news blackout by most of the independent media in Senegal. Most newspapers suspended publication for one day and private radio stations played freedom songs instead of their usual programmes. In the days that followed, journalists in the capital Dakar also staged a series of marches and sit-ins, which drew up to 2,000 people. Diagne was freed from jail on Monday, but his release is only provisional. The editor's defence lawyer said charges by the public prosecutor that he published confidential documents, spread false information and committed acts likely to cause public unrest still hung over him. However, Diagne told Radio France Internationale (RFI) after this release that he hoped some good would come from the furore created by his incarceration. "I think it was the price to pay. Somebody had to make the sacrifice so that the Senegalese government could really become aware of the need for legal reforms," Diagne said. Diagne was detained under Article 80 of the criminal code, which imposes a prison sentence of three to five years on anyone found guilty of committing acts that compromise public security or discredit Senegal's institutions. Many lawyers say the wording of the law is too vague, enabling it to be used against any journalist who criticises the government. "Diagne's imprisonment highlights the urgent need for President Abdoulaye Wade to uphold his stated commitment to press freedom, and to push for the removal of all criminal penalties for press offences from Senegalese law," said Ann Cooper, head of the New York-based media watchdog Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). During a state visit to Paris and with French President Jacques Chirac looking on, Wade said he was in favour of abolishing Article 80. But SYNPIC, the main trade union representing journalists in Senegal, wants more from Wade. "The announcement made by President Wade to suppress controversial article 80 is a good measure. We hope to go further, by eliminating everything that hinder press freedom and by applying laws allowing journalists to work properly," SYNPIC leader Alpha Sall told IRIN on Tuesday. Following the crisis in Cote d'Ivoire, many international media organisations have moved their West African operations to Senegal, widely considered as democracy's flag-bearer in the region. But Reporters Sans Frontieres says Senegal "took a disturbing turn in 2003" and there have been troubling developments this year. "For several months, the government of Abdoulaye Wade has turned to the judiciary... to neutralise journalists," RSF said in a statement issued shortly after Diagne's arrest. Last summer, Senegalese journalist Abdou Latif Coulibaly received death threats after writing a book which denounced the Wade family's interference in national affairs. And in October, the RFI radio correspondent in Dakar was expelled after the government complained about her coverage of a long simmering rebellion in the southern region of Casamance. Diagne's lawyers are now fighting to get the charges against him dismissed and the newspaper editor says he is determined to carry on his fight against injustice. "What I am going to do now is to keep doing my job, as I was doing. That is, carrying out the investigations I was making," he said. Diagne, who was kept in a crowded cell, quipped that he had even found a new topic to investigate -- prisons.