Maputo, 17 Nov (AIM) – The Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD), a prominent Mozambican NGO, has announced that the two South African journalists who had been detained last Wednesday, Bongani Sibiza and Sbonelo Mkhasi, have been released.
The two has been working for the Nigerian channel, NewsCentral Africa TV, and were in Mozambique to cover the demonstrations called by presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane to protest against the allegedly fraudulent results of the 9 October general elections.
In addition to the two South African journalists, the authorities had also detained Charles Magwiro, a Mozambican correspondent of the “Voice of America” radio station, who was also released.
According to Magwiro, speaking hours after being released, “we were simply detained for working on the streets, we were taking pictures of what was happening. However, they perhaps detained us because we were working close to some official buildings.”
Magwiro explained that the police officers tried to damage his working equipment even after he showed his credentials as a journalist.
“Journalists are being threatened. Sometimes they use our own colleagues to intimidate us, they say that we should avoid telling what is happening or cool down the accelerator”, he said.
The CDD head, Adriano Nuvunga, believes that the arrest of the journalists was deliberate, with the aim of hiding the social upheaval that is taking place in Mozambique.
“The journalists were found taking a photograph and it was rumored that they were going to share it with the groups that want to attack the infrastructures. This was just a formal justification for the intimidation and harassment of freedoms in Mozambique”, he said.
The South African Ministry of International Affairs has confirmed the release of the two journalists after their credentials were verified.
(AIM)
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