Gov’t urged to work seriously to enhance media freedoms

DEAD SEA — Media professionals, lawmakers and legal experts on Saturday urged the government to spearhead serious efforts to honour its commitment to implement international recommendations related to freedom of the press.

“Six months have passed since Jordan pledged to study these amendments and nothing happened since then,” Nidal Mansour, president of the Centre for Defending the Freedom of Journalists (CDFJ), said at a meeting held at the Dead Sea under the title of “Legal Media Dialogue”.

“There is a dire need to start a series of [meetings] to look into means to amend these laws,” Mansour added.

“We need a system and a mechanism in place… to address these amendments that Jordan pledged to study,” he said at the event, which runs through Sunday.

In 2009, countries at the UN Universal Periodic Review of the Kingdom’s human rights record issued one recommendation on improving media freedoms in Jordan.

In 2013, they issued 18 such recommendations, of which the government accepted 15 and voiced reservations over three.

Some of the recommendations the government accepted include cancelling or amending all articles in the Penal Code that impose “blatantly unfair” restrictions on freedom of expression as well as amending the Press and Publications Law to ensure the full protection of freedom of speech.

Stressing that the government is keen on addressing these issues and is seriously considering introducing amendments to the Press and Publications Law, Minister of State for Media Affairs and Communications Mohammad Momani said the government has held several meetings with committees at the Lower House, which he said represent a proper umbrella for discussions on how to meet Jordan’s pledges in this regard.

MP Rula Hroub disagreed with the minister, saying there are no actual results so far or any progress made in fulfilling Jordan’s pledges.

“Unfortunately, all the meetings that we had with the government about this issue were called for by parliamentary committees. The government has good intentions but all the meetings were upon personal initiatives by some MPs,” Hroub said during the event, which was held by the CDFJ and attended by media professionals, deputies, lawyers and representatives of the judiciary, and civil society.

Participants at the event called for institutionalising efforts that seek to fulfil Jordan’s pledge in this respect.

They also called for mechanisms to monitor the implementation of the recommendations as the Kingdom is to show the progress it has made in this respect for another UN review in 2017.