Stop muzzling the media - UJA tells UCC

PRESS FREEDOM

KAMPALA - The President of the Uganda Journalists Association(UJA), Hajj Kazibwe Bashir Mbaziira has called upon the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) to stop infringing on media rights.

This comes in the wake of recent events where UCC wrote to Next Media's NBS TV instructing management to suspend three of their workers over allegations of breaching minimum broadcasting standards.

UCC, in a Tuesday, April 30^th letter directed to the Kamwokya based media outlet to suspend the head of news, Joyce Bagala, the head of programmes, and the producer of the live broadcast pending investigations. The three are accused of what the Commission regards as misleading information aired on April 29, 2019.

According to Mbaziira's response, this is another step in the wrong direction by the "regulators" as the media fraternity seeks to build and have a freely conducive and productively progressive media landscape in Uganda.

"As Uganda gets ready to mark this year's World Press Freedom Day, it's saddening to learn of the continued infringement onto the media rights by several government agencies. We are aware of more journalists and media houses whose names and brands have been marked in red by the commission over doing their job in a way that is deemed "unfit". These excesses by the authorities can't go unchallenged," reads the UJA president's letter in part.

In light of these developments, the UJA demanded that the government through her several agencies should respect the rights of journalists and desist from the continued harassment of media players.

Mbaziira also stated, "It's at this time that journalists and all media practitioners ought to speak out further and louder in unity as a body, otherwise our future stands ripe to be eaten pieces. These disturbing events only serve to remind us that: The pen is mightier than the gun."