In a concerning and sad development for free media, an appeal court in Algiers has significantly lengthened the prison sentence of prominent independent journalist, Mr. Ihsane el-Kadi in Algeria. Earlier this year, el-Kadi was initially sentenced to three years in jail, with two years suspended, on charges of receiving foreign financing for his independent media group.
However, the appeal court has now raised his sentence to seven years, with five years to be served in prison. El-Kadi, who owns a media company, was arrested on Christmas Eve last year, and an order was issued to shut down his media company.
His lawyers strongly denied the charges, stating that the only foreign money transferred to the company came from his daughter, who is a partner in the company and resides in the UK. The circumstances of his arrest, as described by his daughter, are chillingly familiar to independent journalists and human rights activists in authoritarian states around the world.
Midnight phone call
The ordeal began with a midnight phone call, followed swiftly by a knock at the door on December 24th, according to Tin-Hinane el-Kadi, who spoke to the BBC’s Focus on Africa radio program. The six policemen who arrived had no arrest warrant and did not specify any charges, she said.
El-Kadi was then handcuffed and forcibly taken in a police car to witness the closure of his media company’s offices. Staff members were sent home, equipment was confiscated, and the premises were sealed. El-Kadi had founded Maghreb Emergent and Radio M around ten years ago, which are known as among the few remaining independent media outlets in Algeria.
Six days later, he appeared before an investigating magistrate who ordered his “preventive detention.” His lawyers were unable to present their objections to his arrest and the closure of his media company because the hearing date was changed without their knowledge.
The charges against him bear the hallmarks of a repressive state, including allegations of undermining national unity and stability, spreading fake news, and receiving funds without proper permits. International human rights groups have decried the arrest of El-Kadi as a grave violation of his human rights and have called for his immediate release, as well as the reinstatement of his media business.
His legal team has condemned the action as a blatant violation of the Algerian constitution and a denial of his fundamental right to a fair trial, as they were denied the opportunity to question his arrest before the investigating judge.
This is not the first time El-Kadi has faced the full force of the Algerian state. However, the immediate trigger for his arrest appears to have been an opinion piece he published on his website, Maghreb Emergent, in which he speculated about President Abdelmadjid Tebboune’s desire for another term in office, despite being 77 years old, and discussed the potential approval of the military.
This article evidently outraged both the president and the military. It is widely recognized that Algeria has never truly been a democracy since gaining independence in 1962. Elections in Algeria are often seen as mere charades, designed to provide a semblance of democratic legitimacy to the candidate chosen behind closed doors by military figures.
In 2019, Algerians took to the streets in what became known as the Hirak protest movement, seeking to bring about change. The protests erupted when former President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who was severely ill and wheelchair-bound, appeared poised to run for a fifth term after 20 years in power.
The Hirak movement successfully thwarted Bouteflika, who was forced to resign and has since passed away. Some of his close associates faced trial, but the reforms ended there. The Hirak protesters sought more than just the removal of the head of state.
The Hirak protesters in Algeria aimed for more than superficial changes or token elections. They wanted a complete overhaul of the political system, with genuine democratic rights and the rule of law upheld not only in theory but also in practice. They were well aware that achieving such transformation would require dismantling the deep-rooted network of connections between security agencies, business elites, and the military—a system that has persisted since Algeria gained independence.
However, lacking centralized leadership, combined with the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and increasing repression, the Hirak movement gradually lost momentum. The old order regained firm control, while many of the revolutionaries either went into exile, became disheartened and apathetic, or were silenced into quiescence.
Press freedom
Unfortunately, this means that the hopes of individuals like Mr. El-Kadi, as well as all those who aspired for a free press and the establishment of the rule of law in Algeria and throughout North Africa, were only briefly glimpsed before being overshadowed by the reinstated status quo.
Most countries in the MENA region have become more hostile to journalists, according to the 2023 World Press Freedom Index report.
The report, compiled annually by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) to review the state of journalism around the world, concluded that press freedom in several major Middle East and Northern Africa (MENA) remains extremely low.
“Whether suppressed by authoritarian rulers or censored by rebel militias, the freedom to report the news is heavily curtailed in the MENA region, where the situation is classified as ‘very serious’ in more than half of its countries,” the report stated.
