Two South Sudanese journalists arrested in January after a video emerged suggesting head of state Salva Kiir was urinating on him have been released, the president of the Sudanese Journalists Union told AFP on Wednesday. Sud (UJOSS), demanding the release of two other colleagues.
Seven journalists from the public television South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation (SSBC) were arrested in January.
Three journalists have since been released.
They had been arrested as part of an investigation after a video that went viral on social media in December suggested that the 71-year-old head of state was urinating on him at an official ceremony.
“Precarious press freedom”
The video shows Salva Kiir, wearing his black hat and light gray suit, with a dark stain spreading down his left leg.
On Tuesday,
"two journalists were released, Victor Ladu and Mustapha Osman"
, welcomed Patrick Oyet, president of UJOSS.
“We are still asking the government to release Garang John and Jacob Benjamin who are still behind bars
,” he continued, calling on the authorities to
“respect the law”.
“If there is a case, the journalists must be brought to justice, otherwise they must be released
,” urged Patrick Oyet.
South Sudan, a landlocked country in East Africa, ranks 128th in the ranking of the NGO Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in terms of press freedom.
RSF asserts that
“press freedom is very precarious in South Sudan, where threats and intimidation against journalists and the media are permanent and where censorship reigns”.
After gaining independence from Sudan in 2011, South Sudan, the youngest state on the planet, descended into a civil war between sworn enemies Riek Machar and Salva Kiir, which left nearly 400,000 dead and millions displaced. between 2013 and 2018.
A peace agreement signed in 2018 provides for the principle of power-sharing within a government of national unity, with Salva Kiir as president and Riek Machar as vice-president.
But it remains largely unenforced, due to ongoing feuds between the two rivals, leaving the country plagued by violence and chronic instability.
The UN and the international community regularly accuse South Sudanese leaders of maintaining a status quo, stoking violence, suppressing political freedoms and embezzling public funds.