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Cameroon President branded press as corrupt - Wikileaks

Tue, 6 Sep 2011 13:42 GMT

Source: trustlaw // George Fominyen

Cameroon's President Paul Biya waves during the leaving ceremony for Pope Benedict XVI at the airport in the capital Yaounde, March 20, 2009. REUTERS/Finbarr O'Reilly

By George Fominyen

DAKAR (TrustLaw) – Cameroonian journalists are corrupt and irresponsible, the president of the West African country told a U.S. Ambassador, according to leaked diplomatic cables posted by Wikileaks at the end of August. 

“They write things that are untrue and publish stories in exchange for more money,” President Paul Biya said of the press at an August 2008 meeting with the then U.S. ambassador to Cameroon, Janet Garvey, according to Wikileaks.

Also, according to Wikileaks, the president acknowledged the need for a free press but complained that the media needs to be more responsible.

Experts say corruption is pervasive and cuts across all sectors in Cameroon including journalism, with many journalists having grown used to accepting bribes (known as "gombo") in exchange for stories. 

Journalists say they are susceptible to corruption and manipulation because of the difficult social and economic situation they are faced with. Apart from journalists working for the government-run media, few earn more than 200,000 FCFA ($430) a month.

“Many journalists earn nothing,” said Franklin Sone Bayen, the founder and editor of Viewpoint Press Visions, an emerging media group.  “To be honest I run a newspaper and I don’t pay anybody; people work with me out of goodwill,” he added.  

“If a reporter goes somewhere and is being offered 50,000 FCFA ($107), which is as good as their monthly salary, it becomes hard to respect ethics. It’s hard to resist (corruption) when they are hungry,” Bayen told TrustLaw by phone from Yaounde, Cameroon’s capital city.

He urged President Biya to institute, via parliament, a fund with significant backing to support media organisations as a sign that he is interested in the development of independent media in the country.

Journalists say the existing mechanism to aid media organisations, which is run through the country’s ministry of communication, is under-funded and the process of obtaining support is fraught with corruption as civil servants ask for kick-backs before including media organisations as beneficiaries.

In the absence of proper financing many media organisations and their journalists depend on obscure and unethical funding.

“In Cameroon people don’t support you because you are a good journalist,” Bayen said. “If you are a good blackmail everybody runs to give you their money so that you can be silent on their issues or they can buy you to attack their opponents or their enemies.”

As a result, there is a real dearth of serious, investigative journalism that could hold authorities to account for bad governance, explained Bayen, an Alfred Friendly Fellow who created the Cameroon Centre for Investigative Journalism.

“For someone who says he wants to be remembered as  the person who brought democracy to Cameroon, he (Biya) should know that there cannot be a viable democracy without a viable press and a viable press can only come about if we have sustainable media organs,” Bayen said.

(Editing by Rebekah Curtis)