and the rest of the media in Liberia are anxiously awaiting the final decision of the LTA on whether it will withdraw his license.
What the Future Holds
In an exclusive interview with the Morgan Global Journalism Review, Peter Quaqua, former president of the Press Union of Liberia (PUL), said that the news media continue to operate under “very difficult circumstances” in Liberia. For things to change, Quaqua said, the government must “move to implement key provisions of the “Declaration of Table Mountain.” The Declaration, signed by most African countries in Table Mountain, South Africa in June, 2007, calls on signatories to repeal laws in their countries that criminalize defamation.
President Sirleaf, upon signing the Declaration
in July 2012 said she was fulfilling “…
a pledge regarding [her] Government's
acceding to the effort toward repealing
criminal defamation laws on our
statutes.” Under her government,
Liberia also signed the Freedom of
Information Act in 2010 and the
African Platform on Access to
Information in 2011, all multinational
accords meant to promote freedom of
the press and freedom of speech.
However, the government has still not followed through with any statute to decriminalize libel laws. Accordingly, journalists unable to satisfy enormous libel judgments against them could still go to jail just as Sieh did for failure to pay the $1.6 million libel judgment brought against him. Under Quaqua’s leadership in 2012, the PUL submitted a draft bill to the Liberian Legislature that would abolish the defamation laws in accordance with the Table Mountain agreement. Such a bill would hold public figures accountable for their actions as it relates to service in government. The bill is yet to be written into law.
Quaqua, on April 28, 2014 was elected president of the West African Journalists Association (WAJA), a platform he said he would use to address “criminal defamation, insults laws, access to information…” and more across the entire West African Sub-region by seeking to partner with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). In an interview with The Gambian Affairs newspaper, Quaqua said, “We [WAJA] shall call the attention of our political leaders and seek to revive and strengthen our observatory status at ECOWAS”. All 16 West African countries including Liberia are members of ECOWAS. Quaqua insists that journalists will continue to push “for the harmonization of media regulatory laws that will increase freedom of speech not only in Liberia, but also throughout the West African sub-region.”
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Liberia