The Haitian media organisation, SOS Journalistes, on Friday called on the recently-installed Presidential Transitional Council (CPT) to use its influence to advance the cases of the journalists who have been murdered in the country.
In a statement marking World Press Freedom Day, the SOS Journalistes also pleaded with the Superior Council of the Judiciary (CSPJ) to ensure that the cases of people linked to the death of these journalists do not remain pending before the courts and tribunals in the country.
“SOS Journalistes demands justice in the cases of murdered journalists, including Garry Tesse, killed in 2022 after being kidnapped and tortured, allegedly by the henchmen of a justice official in the town of Les Cayes, with the support and the tacit complicity of the highest authorities of the Ministry of Justice in Port-au-Prince.
“SOS Journalistes calls for the relaunch of the investigation into the assassination of Garry Tesse and rejects in advance any denial of justice, as desired and planned by certain wrongdoers in the system,” the SOS Journalistes said in the statement.
The nine-member CPT is headed by Edgar Leblanc Fils, 68, a veteran politician and former president of Haiti’s national assembly. It has promised security, justice, and economic recovery, while constitutional reform and credible general elections also top the agenda, as the troubled Caribbean country seeks its way out of the current political and socio-economic crisis.
Haiti has been steeped in political turmoil and social unrest following the assassination of President Jovenel Moise on July 7, 2021.
Rival gangs have over-run the poverty-stricken French-speaking country, plunging citizens into further despair and forcing several foreign agencies to remove non-essential staff from their offices in Haiti.
More than 2,500 people were killed or injured across Haiti from January to March, according to the United Nations. Nearly 95,000 people have fled Port-au-Prince. People are struggling to find food and access healthcare with Haiti’s ports and airport closed.
SOS Journalistes urged the various political actors and other stakeholders in other key sectors of society to “open up to journalists to facilitate access to information, which represents a determining element in the journalist’s mission to inform”.
It also called on journalists and other media workers to observe ethical and professional rules which would allow them to do their jobs better.
World Press Freedom Day 2024 is being held under the theme “A Press for the Planet: Journalism in the face of the Environmental Crisis”.
