The Committee to Protect Journalists urged Ethiopian authorities on Aug. 20, 2019 to release Mesganaw Getachew, an Ethiopis weekly reporter arrested after recording an interview outside an Addis Ababa court.
The Federal Supreme Court of Ethiopia building in Addis Ababa, photographed on September 5, 2021. (Ethiopia Insight / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0) [file photo]
Mesganaw, who reported for the privately owned Ethiopis weekly, was arrested on Aug. 9 shortly after interviewing lawyer Henok Aklilu outside the Arada First Instance Court, CPJ said. Henok and the paper’s editor, Eskinder Nega, told the group he faced allegations under the Anti-Terrorism Proclamation.
Henok had just attended a hearing in another terrorism case involving two media workers when Mesganaw and others asked him for updates. The journalist recorded the lawyer with a camera built into his eyeglasses because he feared harassment if he filmed openly, Eskinder told CPJ.
Police also arrested Adam Wejera, a member of the Balderas Council, the Addis Ababa movement led by Eskinder, who was also filming, Eskinder said. On Aug. 10, a court granted police 28 days to investigate both men in connection with the June 2019 events in Amhara region that the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed described as a failed coup, Henok said.
“The arrest of journalist Mesganaw Getachew, right after he reported on a court case, and the use of an anti-terror law that is a relic of past repression send a message that Ethiopia is reverting to old tools to silence dissent and criticism,” said Muthoki Mumo, CPJ’s sub-Saharan Africa representative.
Zinabu Tunu, spokesperson for the attorney general’s office, told CPJ in an Aug. 19 email that there was “credible suspicion” that the two were involved in the conspiracy to topple the Amhara regional administration and in the killing of the armed forces chief of staff. He said the arrests had nothing to do with their opinions or reporting.
Federal police spokesperson Jeylan Abdi said Mesganaw had been filming without permission inside the court compound with an eyeglass camera, which made officers suspicious.
CPJ said Mesganaw was the latest media worker detained in connection with the alleged coup attempt. It had documented the arrests of Berihun Adane and Getachew Ambachew of the Amharic-language broadcaster ASRAT in July and was investigating the arrest of journalist and Balderas member Elias Gebru, also facing terrorism allegations.
Police had assaulted, arrested and briefly detained Mesganaw on May 22, 2019 while he was reporting on home demolitions in the Arat Kilo neighborhood of Addis Ababa, and he was released on bail, CPJ said. More than 200 people were arrested in connection with the June events, according to media reports cited by the group.
Sources: Committee to Protect Journalists (Aug. 20, 2019), Ethiopian Monitor (Aug. 21, 2019)