Global Digital Download - Africa News

Senegalese authorities have expelled Chadian journalist and blogger Makaila Nguebla, an opponent of his country's President Idriss Déby who has ruled Chad for more than two decades, to neighboring Guinea after refusing to grant him political refugee status. Nguebla, who was living in exile in Senegal's capital city of Dakar since 2005, was deported on May 8, 2013. He settled in Senegal after being arrested in Tunisia in 2005; thanks to international pressure, Tunisian authorities did not deport him back to Chad.

Yesterday, the Ethiopian Supreme Court upheld the conviction and extreme sentence of award-winning online journalist Eskinder Nega, who now faces 18 years in prison. Nega was arrested in September 2011 and charged with “terrorism” under a vague law in Ethiopia that has been used to target online journalists and political dissenters. His trial and appeal faced repeated delays, while international human rights and free expression groups continued to criticize his imprisonment and punishment.

In an opinion released today by Freedom Now, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found the Government of Ethiopia’s continued detention of independent Ethiopian journalist and blogger Eskinder Nega a violation of international law. The panel of five independent experts from four continents held that the government violated Mr. Nega’s rights to free expression and due process. The UN Working Group called for his immediate release.

Al Jazeera’s English and Arabic websites are reported to have been blocked in Ethiopia, raising fresh fears that the government is continuing its efforts to silence the media. Though the authorities in Addis Ababa have refused to comment on the reported censorship, Google Analytics data accessed by Al Jazeera shows that traffic from Ethiopia to the English website had plummeted from 50,000 hits in July 2012 to just 114 in September. Traffic data revealed a similar drop for the Arabic website, with visits to the site dropping to 2 in September from 5,371 in July.

The University of Kinshasa, the largest university in the Democratic Republic of Congo, has nearly 30 000 students, faculty, and research staff—but only 800 computers. And although its internal data network is fast enough to support on-campus e-mail, virtual library access, and online coursework, its link to the outside world is no better than that of a typical household in the United States or Europe.When I visited the university about a year ago, the restricted capacity meant that only 200 senior staff had Internet privileges—for whatever those were worth. I was able to go online for a short time, but the connection was barely usable. Web pages timed out or loaded so slowly that after about 10 minutes, I simply gave up.

MTN is being sued in U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia by Turkish telecom Turkcell for interfering with its contract for 3G service in Iran. Turkcell says MTN offered Iran weapons (including military helicopters and sniper rifles), and UN votes. Former MTN Irancell executive Chris Kilowan has testified that MTN offered to “provide access by the Iranian Ministry of Defense to MTN’s devices” to “facilitate installation of eavesdropping technology on MTN devices" and technical help with spying on Iran’s citizens. MTN is also accused of offering hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes to South Africa’s ambassador in Iran and Iran’s deputy foreign minister. Turkcell claims it was first awarded the 3G license that MTN secured in 2005 and holds to this day.

Kenya's president has launched a $14.5bn (£9.1bn) project to build a new city intended to be an IT business hub and dubbed "Africa's Silicon Savannah". It will take 20 years to build Konza Technology City about 60km (37 miles) from the capital, Nairobi. It is hoped that more than 20,000 IT jobs will be created in Konza by 2015, and more than 200,000 jobs by 2030.

WCIT has got off to a quick and effective start. Having spent much of the past year preparing for the conference and notwithstanding a number of last-minute contributions, the governments of the world are ready for what will be a contentious conference. The first day saw the heads of delegations meet and thrash out agreements that their staff had already largely agreed. Then came the opening ceremony and a stage-managed but important display of support between the ITU and ICANN. The message was plain: WCIT will not be about Internet governance.

Eskinder Nega, an award-winning journalist who has been imprisoned for over a year, appeared briefly in court two weeks ago to appeal the terrorism charges levied against him. Eskinder has unwaveringly denied the charges, maintaining that blogging about human rights abuses and democracy is not a form of terrorism.

The most visible face of Guinea-Bissau's blogosphere, António Aly Silva, wrote that he is being accused of “the crime of incitement to war” and that an international arrest warrant was issued against him by the regime in power since the coup of April 2012. In an interview for the blog O Informador (The Insider), Aly talks about his escape to Dakar and current exile in Portugal

As the Web increasingly becomes a conduit for expression of social unrest, Zambia and Malawi are moving to close down and more closely monitor online media. The attempts to shut down online news sites come in the wake of popular uprisings in Africa and the Middle East last year, and pose a threat to the growth of the Internet in the region, critics say.

The special commission created by Malawi's new president to investigate opposition blogger Robert Chasowa's death in September 2011 has concluded that he was murdered, as his family and colleagues had suspected all along. 

Social media has been in the news lately. Salvos from political leaders and various sectors of society, especially following the death of Cynthia Okosogu have tended to portray social media a pervasive enabler of evil. Some have called for curtailing the freedom, whilst others have taken up argument on the other side of the divide, stressing that Social media represents a democratic platform to express opinions and views freely and without fear or reprisal. Only this week, President Barack Obama of the United States of America stated that in this modern world, where all sorts can be published at the click of a button, to respond with violence, simply empowers those who wish to generate hate. Whilst the context was that of the condemnable film that has triggered so much violence, this statement recognizes the pervasive power of the Social media platforms to spread information with unpredictable consequences.

The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) condemns the blocking of YouTube by Sudanese authorities. On 16 September 2012, the Sudanese Ministry of Communication blocked YouTube from the Internet without reasons and without details. The decision was strongly condemned by several journalists and activists, who tried to call the National Communication Authority, but were not provided with information.  

On 13 July, 2012, Ethiopia's federal court sentenced a prominent Ethiopian blogger Eskinder Nega and 23 other opposition activists to 18 years in jail for allegedly participating in terrorist activities. Eskinder Nega is a journalist, who turned to blogging to find a breathing space online for his dissenting views, has been in a prison for a year now. 14 September, 2012 marks the first anniversary of his arrest.

Citizens need to become more vigilant about businesses that censor Internet freedom in South Africa and not focus only on government restrictions. By Yazeed Kamaldien. Professor Jane Duncan, Highway Africa journalism conference chairperson for media and information society, has warned at a journalism conference this week that privately-owned Internet Service Providers (ISPs) play a role too in censoring the Internet. Duncan is former head of the Freedom of Expression Institute in South Africa and is currently based at the school of journalism and media studies at Rhodes University in Grahamstown.

Controversial Kenyan blogger and Twitter user Robert Alai was detained in police cells on Tuesday 21 August, 2012, for allegedly abusing the Kenya Information and Communication Act. Alai is accused of claiming that Kenyan government spokesperson Alfred Mutua wanted to kill him, and alleging Mutua's involvement in ordering the murder of human rights activists, Oscar King'ara and Paul Oulu, in 2009. Alai pleaded not guilty and was released on a cash bail of 100,000 Kenyan shillings.

South Africa-based telecom MTN shows little respect for the human rights of its users. Operating in Iran and Syria, they have been implicated in monitoring and tracking of activists. The company lacks a coherent human rights policy and has taken no steps toward a transparent, multi-stakeholder dialogue. MTN had the audacity to hire a PR team and ask us about their company's public perception. We told them it doesn't matter what they appear to be doing -- it matters what they actually do.

Nigeria has a relatively high internet penetration rate, driven primarily by a rapid expansion of mobile platforms. Recent figures suggest that over a third of the population have access to the internet and there are over 50 mobile phones per 100 Nigerians. However, internet access is concentrated geographically within just 16 percent of the country, and overwhelmingly within urban areas. 

Some believe it's by looking up to the heavens. Not in hope of divine intervention, but as an opportunity: satellite-powered broadband could be the answer to Africa's connectivity conundrum. The internet is, as one US senator once put it, a series of tubes. His comments went down in internet folklore and were roundly mocked - but his remarks were loosely true. For the internet to get around the world it needs cables - lots of them.

Under intense social media backlash, Nigerian Senate President David Mark denies that he called for the censorship of social media in Nigeria. He says "mischief-makers" took his comments out of context. David Mark's Special Advisor, Kola Ologbondiyan issued the following statement: Recently, the President of the Senate, Senator David Mark, delivered a keynote address at the Senate press corps Retreat in Umuahia, Abia Sate. 

Senate President, Senator David Mark, Thursday, called for a check on the menace of the social media on the Nigerian society, saying that people now use them to demean their leaders. Mark said the need to check the social media became necessary, as they do not have the avenue for retraction of whatever they had done.

Reporters Without Borders still believes that the 2012 Proclamation on Telecom Fraud Offences as it is worded currently is disproportionately vague and could be applied to severely restrict the use of VoIP, ensuring the Ethio-Telecom network retains its service monopoly and maintains its revenue levels. The criminal law should be precise and be interpreted, we believe, as unambiguously as possible to protect people’s right to communicate using VoIP services.

Ethiopia has always been a country at the cutting edge of Internet censorship in Africa. In the wake of violence after the 2005 elections, when other states were only beginning to recognize the potential for online reporters to bypass traditional pressures, Meles Zenawi's regime was already blocking major news sites and blog hosts such as blogspot.com. This year, the strictures tightened again, with what many observers believe was the rollout of a far more pervasive and sophisticated blocking system.

Yesterday’s protests in Sudan saw the arrest of many protesters from the streets by police and National Intelligence Security Service (NISS) agents. Among them is prominent Sudanese Twitter personality and activist Usamah Mohammed Ali (@simsimt). In his last tweet, Usamah was advocating free content to help spread the word about the events happening on the streets in the capital Khartoum.

Ethiopians have their attention focused on the controversial new bill which criminalizes the use of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services such as Skype and Google Talk. Netizens are especially furious over the country’s state owned Ethio-Telecom, which proposed the new bill. Meles Zenawi's government claims that the new bill is meant to prevent external security threats. A number of Facebook groups have already been created to condemn the state-controlled telecommunication service provider.

The Humble School, which serves needy children in a part of Africa ravaged by poverty and HIV, is on the front lines of an effort to reinvent developing world literacy programs with technology. The premise is that the new economics of digital publishing might make more and better books available in classrooms like Mr. Opio's.

Ethiopia’s state-owned Internet service provider, the Ethiopian Telecommunication Corporation (Ethio-Telcom), has begun performing deep-packet inspection of all Internet traffic in the country. The country’s government recently ushered in new legislation that criminalises the use of services such as Skype, Google Talk and other forms of Internet phone calling. The new law, which came into effect on 24 May, makes use of Internet voice services punishable by hefty fines and up to 15 years in prison.

Take Africa, for instance, where an emerging information technology industry is betting its future on serving customers and businesses through mobile cloud applications. At the same time, governments and non-governmental organizations are betting that cloud-based technology can help transform their economies and societies, spurring improvements in education, public health, and the environment.

Ethiopia’s only ISP, state-owned Ethio-Telecom, has just installed a system for blocking access to the Tor network, which lets users browse anonymously and access blocked websites. At the same time, the state-owned printing presses are demanding the right to censor the newspapers they print. Reporters Without Borders is very worried by these attempts to reinforce government control of news and information.

Secrecy laws planned for South Africa fundamentally threaten free speech and investigative journalism, and could have a chilling effect on the rest of Africa, a united front of human rights lawyers, newspaper editors and Nobel prize-winning writers have warned in interviews with the Guardian. The protection of state information bill – dubbed the "secrecy bill" – envisages draconian penalties of up to 25 years in prison for whistleblowers and journalists who possess, leak or publish state secrets. It has been described as the first piece of legislation since the end of apartheid in 1994 to undermine South Africa's democracy.

Africa is quickly becoming an I(C)T hub, with Kenya in particular in the news lately. For this week's roundup, we're focusing on technology in Africa, so check out the articles we've been reading

Reporters Without Borders calls on Libya’s interim parliament, the National Transitional Council (NTC), to repeal the law criminalizing any “insult to the Libyan people and its institutions” that it adopted on 2 May. “This law contravenes the interim constitutional provisions that the NTC adopted and the international law to which it is subject,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Criminalizing certain opinions, going so far as to make them punishable by imprisonment, endangers freedom of expression and information, especially as the law’s criteria are vague and imprecise and leave a great deal of room for arbitrary interpretation.