Journalist detained in Cabo Delgado

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Journalist detained in Cabo Delgado

5:19 CAT | 05 Jan 2019

O País

The Mozambican police on Saturday morning detained a journalist, Amade Abubacar, in Macomia district, in the northern province of Cabo Delgado, according to a report in the online edition of the independent paper “O Pais”.

Abubacar works for the publicly owned Mass Communications Institute (ICS). He was detained supposedly because he was photographing internally displaced people, fleeing from villages in the interior of Macomia, due to murderous raids by terrorist groups believed to be Islamic fundamentalists.

According to eye-witnesses cited by “O Pais”, Abubacar was seized at a Macomia bus station. Five policemen handcuffed Abubacar and seized his cell phone. He was then taken to the cells in the Macomia district police command.

Contacted by the paper, the ICS delegate in Cabo Delgado, Paulo Cazimoto, and the provincial police spokesperson, Augusto Guta, said they had no knowledge of the case.

There is no Mozambican law forbidding journalists, or anybody else, from taking photographs in public places. The arrests, and the seizure, of Abubakar’s cell phone are thus entirely illegal.

In this case, Abubakar was merely documenting something that is already well known – the exodus of peasant families from rural Macomia, because of terrorist raids.

“O Pais” notes that hundreds of families are continuing to pour into Macomia town, fleeing from the armed attacks. Some have been accommodated in the homes of relatives, but others are sleeping in the open.

The terrorist attacks began in October 2017 in the district of Mocimboa da Praia. Subsequently the raids have spread to the districts of Macomia, Nangade and Palma.

Source: AIM