PRESS RELEASE: We Refuse a Return to Permission-Based Journalism in The Gambia

We Refuse a Return to Permission-Based Journalism in The Gambia

By Former Presidents of the Gambia Press Union

We write not as distant commentators, but as journalists who have lived through the  darkest chapters of media repression in our country. We write as journalists who stood firm when the cost of speaking out was harassment, intimidation, exile, imprisonment — and, for our fallen colleague, friend and former GPU president Deyda Hydara, death itself.

Five former GPU Presidents express concern over gov’t’s proposed National Press Accreditation Policy for The Gambia and the Broadcasting and Online Content Regulations, 2025

It is precisely because of this history that we cannot remain silent today.as new laws and policies, clothed in technical and administrative language, quietly resurrect mechanisms that Gambian journalists once rejected with courage and sacrifice.

The draft National Press Accreditation Policy for The Gambia and the Broadcasting and Online Content Regulations, 2025, though presented in administrative language, introduce systems of registration,accreditation, and executive discretion that collectively signal a return to permission-based journalism.

We therefore ask a simple but urgent question: What  problem exactly is the Ministry of Information seeking to solve?

It is important to underscore that the media in The Gambia is not unregulated. The Media Council of The Gambia, established by the Gambia Press Union, exists precisely to self-regulate the profession. The Council has over the years resolved numerous complaints, mediated disputes, and worked consistently to uphold “ethical standards and professional conduct” within the media sector. It represents a broad and credible cross-section of society, including journalists, media owners, civil society, and the private sector. Rather than undermining or duplicating this framework through State-controlled committees or accreditation mechanisms, the priority should be to strengthen and empower the Media Council to carry out its mandate effectively. Creating parallel structures driven by executive authority risks confusion, politicization, and a gradual erosion of trust, outcomes that would ultimately weaken, rather than improve, media accountability.

The Gambia  media sector today is more open, diverse, and with professionalism on the rise than it has ever been. Why then the renewed impulse to register journalists, vet them through security lenses, and condition their work on administrative approval? History teaches us that such measures are never neutral. This is not reform. It is regression.

Why This Should Concern Every Gambian

Freedom of the press is not a privilege for journalists alone. It is the public’s right to know — the means by which citizens hold power to account. When journalists must seek State approval to practice their profession, it is not the press that is silenced - it is the people.

International law is clear.

Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) guarantees that:

“Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice.”

Similarly, Article 9 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, echoes this protection and affirms that:

“Every individual shall have the right to receive information. Every individual shall have the right to express and disseminate his opinions within the law.”

These provisions are neither abstract ideals nor optional aspirations. They are binding legal obligations on The Gambia.

Our Own Laws Say the Same

The 1997 Constitution of the Republic of The Gambia guarantees freedom of expression and of the press, recognizing the media as a pillar of democracy. The Constitution does not confer on the executive the authority to decide who qualifies as a journalist.

Regionally, the ECOWAS Revised Treaty commits Member States to principles of accountability, transparency, and democratic governance — values that cannot thrive where journalists operate under fear of deregistration, accreditation withdrawal, or vague “security” determinations.

Lessons We Ignore at Our Peril/Lessons from Our Past

We have seen this pattern before. During the era of the Jammeh dictatorship, laws were introduced gradually — each justified and defended as necessary, reasonable, or temporary.  They sought to  register, monitor, and discipline journalists. Media houses were licensed into compliance. Dissent was reframed as a threat to national security.  Today’s proposals revive that same architecture of control, even if the vocabulary has changed.

Deyda Hydara warned us that: “once the State decides who qualifies as a journalist, freedom of the press is already lost.” His opposition to journalist registration and State-controlled media commissions was rooted in lived experience, not theory.

Our Call to Action

This moment demands clarity, courage, and collective action.

We call on the Gambia Press Union, individual journalists and all media bodies — including the Media Owners Council and the Editors Forum — to remain vigilant, united, and principled. Fragmentation has always been the ally of repression. Silence, even when motivated by caution, creates space for abuse. The defense of press freedom must be proactive, not retroactive.

To the young journalists of The Gambia: the freedoms you enjoy today were hard-won. They were secured through sacrifice, courage, and, in some cases, blood. Do not assume they are permanent. Question every policy that conditions your work on permission. Organize, speak up, and defend your professional independence — not only for yourselves, but for the society you serve.

We also call on Gambian civil society organizations, including human rights groups, youth and women’s organizations, and their umbrella body, The Association of Non-Governmental Organizations (TANGO), to recognize that an attack on press freedom is an attack on civic space itself. A constrained media environment weakens advocacy, erodes accountability, and ultimately silences the very communities civil society exists to serve. We therefore urge CSOs to lend their voices and organizational strength to the defense of media freedom as a shared democratic cause.

Finally, we call on regional and international partners — including the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), the Federation of African Journalists (FAJ), the Commonwealth Journalists Association (CJA), The African Editors’ Forum ((TAEF), the Congress of African Journalists (CAJ), the West African Journalists Association (WAJA),  the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), Article 19 , IFEX  and allied media freedom organizations — to stand firmly in solidarity with Gambian journalists, as they did during the darkest years of the Jammeh dictatorship. If necessary, to once again play the historic role in ensuring that the eyes of the world remain fixed on The Gambia, and that any regression is met with principled global scrutiny and international pressure.

In Solidarity

We stand firmly in solidarity with the GPU leadership, with journalists across the country, and with all Gambians who believe that democracy cannot survive without a free press.

A free press is the lifeblood of accountability. Any regression, however technical in appearance, must be confronted collectively and decisively.

We owe this vigilance to Deyda Hydara and to all those who paid the highest price for our freedoms. We also owe it to the generations who must not inherit silence disguised as stability.

Signed and endorsed by Demba A. Jawo, NdeyTapha Sosseh, Hon. Madi M K Ceesay, Sheriff Bojang Junior, and Muhammed S. Bah