Angola: Radio Journalist Killed

A radio journalist with private own Radio Despertar, a station critical of the ruling MPLA government, Alberto Graves Chakussanga, was gunned down at his house in Luanda on 5 September 2010. Chakussanga’s neighbors and relatives found the journalist lying in the kitchen of his house located in Luanda’s Viana District with a bullet wound in his back.

Chakussanga was a presenter of a weekly, Umbundu-language news call-in program on Radio Despertar. No arrests have been made made so far. According to media reports, police sources say Chakusanga was killed after a long conversation with unknown assassins. 

Committee to Protect Journalist (CPJ) also reported that Chakussanga had a following with the Ovimbundu, Angola’s largest ethnic group who originate from the south of the country, a stronghold of former rebel movement UNITA, according to local journalists. Radio Despertar was launched in December 2006, under the terms of a 2002 peace deal between the ruling MPLA and UNITA. 

In a press conference on 7 September 2010, Rui Falcão, secretary of information of the MPLA politburo accused Radio Despertar of repeatedly inciting the population to commit “civil disobedience” since 6 September 2010 in support of the opposition former rebel movement UNITA, according to news reports. The accusations were based on interviews and commentary that criticized the government’s performance. In a press statement today, Radio Despertar rejected the allegations as “unfounded and slanderous,” and asserted its editorial independence. Local journalists said the station has been critical of both UNITA and the authorities, and they allege that the government electronically interferes with its frequency in parts of Luanda.

Chakussanga, 32, was also a lecturer at the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Agostinho Neto state university and at the Angolan police academy, according to local journalists. A few hours before his death, Chakussanga had left his pregnant wife at a hospital where she gave birth later that day to a baby boy, colleagues said. URL > cpj.org/2010/09/angolan-radio-presenter-gunned-down.php.

MISA-Position

MISA expresses shock at the brutal killing of a dedicated journalist and calls on Angolan authorities to bring the killers to book. MISA condemn the threats by MPLA and the Angolan government towards Radio Despertar and calls for the threats to be brought to complete stop and allow the radio station to exercise its freedom of expression as guaranteed by international tools such as the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. MISA further extends condolences to the believed family and promise to stand alongside them until justice shall prevail. //End//

-September 09, 2010 by MISA

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Source: www.misa.org (received via e-mail alert on 09.09.2010)