• INCIDENTS
    • Nigeria
      • South West
      • South South
      • South East
      • North Central
      • North East
      • North West
    • West Africa
      • Senegal
      • Benin Republic
      • Burkina Faso
      • Cape Verde
      • Cote d’Ivoire
      • Gambia
      • Ghana
      • Guinea
      • Guinea-Bissau
      • Liberia
      • Mali
      • Mauritania
      • Niger Republic
      • Sierra Leone
      • Togo
  • NEWS
    • Defending the Civic Space – Blog
    • AML – CFT NEWS
    • Foreign News
    • Local News
    • Videos
  • RESOURCES
    • Policy briefs
    • Restrictive legislations
    • Press statements
    • INFOGRAPHICS
    • Publications
    • Newsletters
  • ACTION GROUP
    • Join
    • Steering Committee
    • Members
    • Group Activities
    • Member Activities
  • SPECIAL CAUSES
    • COVID-19
      • General News
      • Incidents
      • Eyewitness Reports
    • #ENDSARS
      • General News
      • Missing Persons
      • Gallery
      • Trends & Hashtags
  • CSR-HUB
Menu
  • INCIDENTS
    • Nigeria
      • South West
      • South South
      • South East
      • North Central
      • North East
      • North West
    • West Africa
      • Senegal
      • Benin Republic
      • Burkina Faso
      • Cape Verde
      • Cote d’Ivoire
      • Gambia
      • Ghana
      • Guinea
      • Guinea-Bissau
      • Liberia
      • Mali
      • Mauritania
      • Niger Republic
      • Sierra Leone
      • Togo
  • NEWS
    • Defending the Civic Space – Blog
    • AML – CFT NEWS
    • Foreign News
    • Local News
    • Videos
  • RESOURCES
    • Policy briefs
    • Restrictive legislations
    • Press statements
    • INFOGRAPHICS
    • Publications
    • Newsletters
  • ACTION GROUP
    • Join
    • Steering Committee
    • Members
    • Group Activities
    • Member Activities
  • SPECIAL CAUSES
    • COVID-19
      • General News
      • Incidents
      • Eyewitness Reports
    • #ENDSARS
      • General News
      • Missing Persons
      • Gallery
      • Trends & Hashtags
  • CSR-HUB

Mauritanian Reporter Held for Two Days Over Facebook Post

  • Date of Occurrence
    May 20, 2021
  • State/Country
    Nouakchott, Mauritania
  • Details
  • Comments 0
  • prev
  • next
  • Bookmark
  • Share
  • Report
  • Leave a review
  • prev
  • next
Image
Description

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemns a Mauritanian reporter’s arrest for 48 hours over nothing more than a Facebook post questioning government spending. The authorities must safeguard press freedom in Mauritania, RSF said.

Abdellahi Mohamed Ould Atigha, the editor of the independent newspaper Al Hoora, was suddenly arrested – without any warning or prior summons – on 24 April by police who went to his home in Boutilimit, a town 165 km southeast of the capital Nouakchott.

It was only on arriving at the town’s police station that he was told he had been arrested because of a complaint by social affairs minister Naha Mint Haroun Cheikh Sidiya over a Facebook post in which he questioned what had happened to money earmarked for disadvantaged sectors of the population.

Ould Atigha was released 48 hours later after the minister’s father withdrew the complaint. When reached by RSF, the journalist deplored the “lack of transparency on the part of the authorities” and said there was “no justification” for his arrest.

“Arresting a journalist for an ordinary Facebook post that just asked questions is totally disproportionate,” RSF said. “This speaks both to a dangerous level of scrutiny of social media by the authorities, and to a manifest desire to suppress dissent. We urge the government safeguard the accessibility and transparency of information in Mauritania and to desist from arbitrary arrests of journalists, who must be able to work with complete freedom.”

This is not the first time that journalists have been arrested in Mauritania for questioning what happens to government money. Two bloggers, Abderrahmane Weddady and Cheikh Ould Jiddou, spent more than two months in prison in 2019 for reporting comments being made by bloggers and media outlets in the Middle East about the freezing of a two-billion dollar account in the United Emirates that was allegedly opened by persons close to Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz.

Details
  • Date of Occurrence
    2021-05-20
  • State/Country
    Nouakchott
  • Source
    https://rsf.org/en/mauritanian-reporter-held-two-days-over-facebook-post
Location

Nouakchott, Mauritania

Get Directions
Region
  • Mauritania
Rights & Freedom Violated
  • Freedom of Expression
  • Press Freedom
Gender of Victim(s)
  • Male
Mode of Attacks
  • Forced Disappearances, Unlawful Arrests and Detention
  • Comments are closed.
  • You May Also Be Interested In

    Mauritania: Activist Arrested for Social Media Posts

      Jan24
      • Freedom of Expression

      Mauritania Jails Bloggers Abderrahmane Weddady and Cheikh Ould Jiddou on False News Charges

        Mar22
        • Press Freedom

        This site is supported by:

        FGHR-150x50
        OSF-150x50
        fh
        ford-foundation-logo-150x50

        Closing Civic Spaces is a publicly-available database on closing spaces for civic engagement and civil society in Nigeria & West Africa. Data  is compiled from public sources.

        • +234-814-500-0067
        • Lagos, Nigeria

        Stay informed

        Get incidents as they happen

        Support our campaign to protect the civil society space

        Donate Now
        Donate to Defend the Civil Society Space

        © 2019 Closing Civic Spaces by Spaces for Change. Spaces for Change is a member of the Global NPO Coalition on FATF.

        Images, texts, & other forms of content are copyright of their respective owners.

        Cart

        • Facebook
        • Twitter
        • WhatsApp
        • Telegram
        • Pinterest
        • LinkedIn
        • Tumblr
        • VKontakte
        • Mail
        • Copy link