The South African Communist Party (SACP) this week made a public call for a law to be instituted to protect the country’s president against "insults". The call, by one of its provincial branches, was in response to growing public outrage about R240...
In South Africa, the singing of "struggle songs" remains a bone of contention. Some South Africans contend, along with the courts, that songs should be banned when their lyrics incite violence. Other South Africans regard the songs as a way to...
Nigerian poet Wole Soyinka knows something about the dangers of speaking out. In 1967 the Nobel Prize winner was arrested and held in solitary confinement for two years after criticising the Nigerian government, a military coup had taken place in...
South Africa’s president Jacob Zuma dropped his defamation lawsuit against the country’s most prominent newspaper cartoonist, Zapiro.
Rural people travelled hundreds of kilometres to voice their objections at South Africa’s parliament about a new bill that threatens to impose a separate and unequal legal system on them --- just to hear that their submissions are being blocked....
From mid-June to early August this year, Sudan has witnessed nationwide protests directly calling for regime change, sparked by an alarming increase in prices. The protests were met with a massive crackdown on civil liberties, and a wave of arrests...
Ethiopia has pardoned two Swedish journalists charged with supporting terrorism and will release them soon, a government source said on Monday. Johan Persson and Martin Schibbye were sentenced to 11 years in prison in October 2011, after illegally...
South Africa’s parliament is in its final stages of reviewing a bill that, if passed, could have severe implications for press freedom in the country and the African continent. The Protection of State Information Bill (also known as the Secrecy...
MAGAZINE In many parts of the world, malaria continues to kill millions — yet experts are still denied access to vital research. Bart Knols reports
Prominent Ethiopian journalist Eskinder Nega was today sentenced to 18 years in prison for violating anti-terrorism laws. He and 23 other activists and writers were convicted last month, and accused of links with US-based opposition group Ginbot...
Freedom of expression in Africa. Index on Censorship covers free speech, freedom of religion, artistic freedom on the continent of Africa.