MISA Mozambique: Education director who ran over journalist covering teachers’ protest must be held accountable

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

MISA Mozambique: Education director who ran over journalist covering teachers’ protest must be held accountable

6:39 CAT | 11 Jan 2024

Screen grab: Notícias Online

The district education director who ran over a journalist who was covering a teachers’ protest in Nacala-Porto in the north of the country must be held accountable, the Mozambican chapter of the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA Mozambique) demanded on Wednesday.

“MISA urges the Justice authorities in Nacala to act in an exemplary manner to hold the district director of Education accountable,” a statement from the press freedom watchdog reads.

The incident occurred on Monday, when TV Sucesso journalist Filesmar Essiaca Agostinho was covering the protest of a group of teachers demonstrating outside the District Directorate of Education of Nacala-Porto, in the province of Nampula, against delays in salary and overtime payments.

According to MISA, the journalist trying to get a reaction from the district director regarding the teachers’ complaints. when he drove by and hit Filesmar Essiaca Agostinho on the leg.

“In addition to running him over, Alexandre Mário damaged part of the television broadcaster’s working equipment.

After what happened, the director did not provide assistance to the victim, who was rescued by members of the public,” reads the note from MISA, which adds that, “at the health unit, the reporter underwent a plaster cast application, and the orthopaedic doctor ordered him to rest for 30 days, therefore, a month without working, with regular checks every three days”.

MISA will take “legal measures that it deems necessary to hold the director responsible” for this “blatant abuse of press freedoms and the right to information”.

“In addition to the legal implications, MISA understands that Alexandre Mário’s actions – the actions of a state employee – in no way dignify the state, much less someone who holds a management position,” the communique concludes.

Mozambican teachers have, in recent weeks, been demanding the payment of around 11 months of overdue overtime, while simultaneously demonstrating against salary cuts and delays caused by the implementation of the Single Salary Table (TSU).

The TSU, the target of criticism from various segments of the public service, was approved in 2022 with the aim of eliminating asymmetries and keeping the state’s wage bill under control in the medium term, but its implementation, itself marked by delays in payments, caused salaries to soar, with expenditure rising from 11.6 billion meticais/month (€169 million) to 15.8 billion meticais (€231 million).

Source: Lusa ( Misa Moçambique