About
Journalists play a vital role in ensuring the rights of access to information. This role is even more important in the context of a pandemic, where open public discourse and the free flow of information are indispensable in the global effort to counter Covid-19.
The Covid-19 Response in Africa project documents the risks faced by journalists during the pandemic, and provides essential, timely support and resource materials to independent media and journalists in Sub-Saharan Africa to help them fulfill their role of providing quality and reliable information about the pandemic.
The resources on this page are part of the Covid-19 response: Together for Reliable Information program, supported by the European Union.
ARTICLE 19 has been engaging in various advocacy activities that seek to preserve the rights of freedom of expression and access to information at the national, regional, multilateral and global levels. These activities are grounded in sound research and monitoring of attacks against journalist, legal analysis and monitoring of policies that impact press freedom.
Where?
Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan, South Sudan, Tanzania, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Ghana, Nigeria and Senegal.
Freedom of Expression and press freedom violations during the Covid-19 pandemic
This project is limited to the legal and policy changes and human rights violations against journalists in the context of Covid-19. Only cases that fit the following categories are included:
- The legislation in question is linked to Covid-19 and impacts on freedom of expression;
- The incident in question relates to a journalist;
- The incident in question is motivated by the journalist’s work; and
- The incident in question is a violation related to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Human rights violations are acts or omissions performed by agents of the State or by persons or groups of persons acting with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State which fail to respect the rights of individuals. These include acts such as arbitrary arrests and detentions, as well as excessive and unnecessary use of force by agents of the state. Violations may also come about as a result of the state failing to prevent others from depriving individuals of their rights or to remedy such deprivation of rights (including through investigating, providing information and holding those responsible to account through a trial).
During the pandemic, journalists have been beaten by the police, arbitrary arrested and/or detained and had other rights violated. ARTICLE 19 has documented cases of such violations in the target countries. The organisation has also developed a glossary of terms to enable better understanding of the violations journalists have experienced.
Glossary
(click each heading to reveal definitions)
Arrests and detentions
These are violations of the right to liberty and/or fair trial rights, defined here.
An arbitrary arrest is one which falls into one of the following categories, among others :
- When it is clearly impossible to invoke any legal basis justifying the deprivation of liberty.
- When it is carried out without due regard to the international norms relating to the right to a fair trial, such as the right of presumption of innocence and right to a lawyer
- When detention is used in response to the legitimate exercise of human rights, such as arresting peaceful protesters for the mere exercise of their rights to freedom of opinion and expression or freedom association and assembly.
Arbitrary detention – where an arrest is arbitrary, the detention will also be arbitrary. Arrest may not be arbitrary, but detention will be arbitrary if continued detention falls within one of the above categories.
Enforced disappearance
The arrest, detention, abduction or any other form of deprivation of liberty by agents of the State or by persons or groups of persons acting with the authorisation, support or acquiescence of the State, followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or by concealment of the fate or whereabouts of the disappeared person, which place such a person outside the protection of the law.
Physical attacks/arbitrary and extrajudicial killings
These are violations of the right to bodily integrity as defined here:
Excessive/disproportionate use of force: the use of force by law enforcement officers which is excessive or disproportionate to the legitimate objective to be achieved or to the threat posed in a particular situation.
Unnecessary use of force: the use of force by law enforcement officers which is used where the legitimate objective could be achieved without any use of force.
Torture: any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for the purposes of obtaining information or a confession from them, or a third person, punishing them for an act s/he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing them for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of, or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions.
The legal difference between torture and other forms of ill-treatment lies in the level of severity of pain or suffering imposed. In addition, torture requires the existence of a specific purpose behind the act.
Extrajudicial executions/killings: deaths caused intentionally by the attacks or killings by state security forces or paramilitary groups, death squads or other private forces cooperating with the state or tolerated by the state.
Arbitrary killing: refers to the deaths caused by the excessive, disproportionate and illegitimate force by law enforcement officer.
Threats and verbal attacks
These include threats of bodily harm, including death, may be direct, via third-parties, electronic or physical communications, and may be implicit as well as explicit, and encompass references to killing a journalist’s friends, family or sources. These kind of threats may include surveillance or trailing, harassing phone calls, arbitrary judicial or administrative harassment, aggressive declarations by public officials, or other forms of pressure that can jeopardise the safety of journalists in pursuing their work.
Restrictive regulations
These are changes in legislation and/or emergency legislation, policies and government guidelines linked to COVID-19 pandemic that restrict the right to freedom of expression and information.
Journalists
Individuals who are dedicated to investigating, analysing, and disseminating information, in a regular and specialised manner, through any type of written media, broadcast media (television or radio), or electronic media. With the advent of new forms of communication, journalism has extended into new areas, including citizen journalism’.
Disinformation
False information that is disseminated intentionally to cause serious social harm. Read about Disinformation and freedom of opinion and expression on the UN website
Misinformation
Misinformation: The dissemination of false information unknowingly. Read about Disinformation and freedom of opinion and expression on the UN website
Access to information
The right of access to information gives individuals, groups, and companies the right to obtain information, documents or data from public bodies without having to give reasons while also obliging those public bodies to facilitate access to information through responses to requests and proactive publication. The bodies must ensure “easy, prompt, effective and practical access”. Read General Comment 34
Human-impact country briefings in English
(click the image to open the briefing document)
Human-impact country briefings in other languages
(click the image to open the briefing document)
Analytical regional reports
Our regional reports provide a deeper analysis of the trends we identified across two regions – Eastern and Southern Africa, and West Africa – and offer recommendations for change.
Legal standards / Q&As
International human rights law
The right to freedom of expression
The right to freedom of expression is protected by Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and Article 9 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (the African Charter). The UN Human Rights Committee, the treaty body of independent experts monitoring states’ compliance with the ICCPR, developed General Comment No. 34 which expands on the meaning of the right to freedom of expression. The African Commission also developed the Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa, which explains the right to freedom of expression in the African Charter.
The scope of the right to freedom of expression is broad. It requires states to guarantee to all people the freedom to seek, receive, or impart information or ideas of any kind, regardless of frontiers, through any media of a person’s choice, either orally, in writing, or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of choice.
The UN Human Rights Committee has affirmed that the scope of the right extends to the expression of opinions and ideas that others may find deeply offensive. The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (African Commission) affirmed that states have an obligation to ‘facilitate the rights to freedom of expression and access to information online and the means necessary to exercise these rights’.
While the right to freedom of expression is fundamental, it is not absolute. A state may, exceptionally, limit the right under Article 19(3) of the ICCPR, provided that the limitation is:
- Provided for by law: Any law or regulation must be formulated with sufficient precision to enable individuals to regulate their conduct accordingly;
- In pursuit of a legitimate aim: Listed exhaustively as respect of the rights or reputations of others, the protection of national security or of public order (ordre public), or the protection of public health or morals; and
- Necessary and proportionate in a democratic society: If a less intrusive measure can achieve the same purpose as a more restrictive one, the least restrictive measure must be applied.
Article 9(2) of the African Charter also reiterates that the right to express and disseminate opinions must be ‘within the law’. In addition, the Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa also provides the requirement for any laws suppressing expression to be legitimate, necessary, and proportionate.
Thus, any limitation imposed by the state on the right to freedom of expression must conform to the strict requirements of this three-part test. Furthermore, Article 20(2) of the ICCPR provides that any advocacy of national, racial, or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility, or violence must be prohibited by law.
The safety of journalists
The UDHR, ICCPR and African Charter do not specifically refer to journalists. However, a number of international standards highlight the importance of protecting journalists in relation to the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of expression and access to information. These include the Human Rights Committee’s General Comment No. 34 and the Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa. The Human Rights Council Resolutions on the Safety of Journalists is another relevant framework. The last resolution, 45/18 of 2020, calls upon states to (among other things) develop and implement strategies for combating impunity for attacks and violence against journalists, including by ‘creating special investigative units or independent commissions, appointing a specialized prosecutor, and adopting specific protocols and methods of investigation and prosecution’.
The Human Rights Council acknowledged ‘the coronavirus disease crisis has significant implications for the work, health and safety of journalists and media workers’, and expressed deep concerns on how it ‘increases the vulnerability of journalists and weakens media sustainability, independence and pluralism and worsens the risk of the spreading of misinformation and disinformation by limiting access to a wide range of reliable information and opinions’.
National frameworks
The right to freedom of expression is guaranteed under the constitutions of all ten countries.
While the right to freedom of expression is fundamental, it is not absolute. Limitations on the right to freedom of expression are only permitted where expression propagates war, incitement of imminent violence, or advocacy of hatred that is based on race, ethnicity, gender, or religion, and that constitutes incitement to cause harm.
The right to freedom of expression may also be limited during a state of emergency but must always pass the three-part test of legality, necessity and proportionality.
Scope and parameters [methodology]
Data collection
Our briefings relied on a review of secondary material, including emergency legislative and statutory instruments, information obtained through the monitoring of print and digital media, and statements from media watchdogs and journalists’ representative bodies.
Data analysis
The data was analysed and structured along predetermined themes, including physical attacks and killings, arbitrary arrests and detentions, threats and verbal attacks, restrictions in regulations, gender-based violations, suppression of access to information, and misinformation.
Scope of violations included
Our briefings look at violations against journalists in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic. While there may have been many violations against journalists, and violations in the context of Covid-19 against citizens’ rights to freedom of expression and access to information, our briefings are limited to only human rights violations against journalists in the context of Covid-19. In this criteria, therefore, only cases fitting in the following categories are included:
- The incident in question relates to a journalist;
- The incident in question is motivated by the journalist’s work; and
- The incident in question is a violation related to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Limitations
The major limitation was that only violations that media houses and media bodies captured could be included in the briefings. This could have resulted in unverified cases being included. To mitigate this, the information from in-country media houses was cross-referenced against online and provincial publications, as well as international media. These were then cross-checked with reports from media representative bodies and legal bodies representing journalists, such as unions, to further verify the cases.
Legal and policy analyses
The pandemic has resulted in a number of policy and legislative changes which have restricted the right to freedom of expression and access to information. ARTICLE 19 has been monitoring the developments in the legal frameworks of the target countries, and has produced legal and policy analyses to be used for advocacy work in protection of press freedom.
Sudan: Cybercrime Law can restrict vital information during pandemic
Nigeria: Prohibitions on false news and criminal defamation should be repealed
Ghana: ‘False information’ prohibitions must be amended
South Africa: Prohibitions of false COVID-19 information must be amended
Zimbabwe: Public Health Order must not be misused to restrict freedom of expression
Ethiopia: Hate speech and disinformation law must not be used to suppress the criticism of the Government
Kenya: Measures to tackle Covid-19 pandemic must not violate human rights
Tanzania: Online Content Regulations 2020 extremely problematic in the context of COVID-19 pandemic
Sudan: Media laws drafted during COVID-19 don’t meet free speech standards
Ethiopia: Analysis of draft law on hate speech and false information
UPR Submissions
ARTICLE 19 has submitted UPR submissions regarding attacks against journalists during Covid-19.The Universal Periodic Review (UPR) is a unique process which involves a periodic review of the human rights records of all 193 UN Member States. The UPR process provides for the participation of all relevant stakeholders. Civil society actors can submit written information regarding the compliance of States with their international human rights obligations. The current and third cycle of the UPR runs from 2017 to 2022 and examines the states’ progress against previously accepted recommendations, including in relation to the right to freedom of expression and information and freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
Zimbabwe: ARTICLE 19 and Gender Media Connect Contribute to the Universal Periodic Review
South Sudan: ARTICLE 19 and Free Press Unlimited Contribute to the Universal Periodic Review
Useful Resources
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights
Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa 2019
Joint Declaration on Freedom of Expression and “Fake News”, Disinformation and Propaganda
Coronavirus: ARTICLE 19 briefing on tackling misinformation
Ensuring the Public’s Right to Know in the Covid-19 Pandemic
Africa: Launch of position paper in response to the COVID-19 pandemic
Kenya: Covid-19 reporting guidelines for journalists
Ethiopia: Government should guarantee Internet access and access to information during coronavirus pandemic
Kenya and Nigeria: Digital rights organisations rebuke restrictions on the rights and freedoms during coronavirus using cyber crimes legislation
West Africa: more transparency, accountability and access to information needed amidst the coronavirus pandemic
