Uganda has refused to let a Canadian journalist working for the Economist re-enter the east African country because of concerns about his reporting, Reuters has reported. For months, government media authorities did not renew the press accreditation of 34-year-old Blake Lambert, who had lived in Uganda for three years.
Returning late on Thursday from a visit to South Africa, he was denied an entry visa. He was put on the first flight out of the country. "Lambert is generally an unwanted person here," said Robert Kabushenga, director of the government's Media Centre.
"He consistently misrepresented and misreported the situation," Kabushenga told Reuters. "We asked him to provide a more balanced outlook on Uganda, but he didn't listen to us." Lambert also worked for the Christian Science Monitor, the Washington Times and Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
Kabushenga went much further: "(The) news reports of Lambert have been prejudicial to our foreign policy in particular and the national interest in general," he wrote. Kabushenga, according to CTV, then added ominously, "In fact, it is actually doing the country more damage and this has to be stopped."
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), said Lambert's expulsion was "outrageous." CPJ Executive Director Ann Cooper said in a statement, "Expelling (him), especially in light of other recent attacks on independent journalists in Uganda, puts into question Uganda's commitment to press freedom."
Speaking by telephone after arriving in Nairobi, in neighboring Kenya, Lambert told Reuters he had been given no explanation by the Ugandan authorities. "If I was thrown out because of my reporting, because someone thought I brought this on myself, that is ridiculous," he said. "I'm even-handed. I report things as I see them."
Lambert said he was returning to Uganda from a short trip to South Africa. As his work permit had recently expired, he tried re-entering Uganda by applying for a tourist visa. He was detain and held in a room at Uganda's Entebbe airport with a plainclothes officer for about 40 minutes, he said. He wasn't allowed to make a phone call and was put on a flight out, he said.
Internal Affairs Minister Ruhakana Rugunda said the Canadian was denied entry to preserve national security. "Lambert's presence in Uganda compromises Uganda's security status," Rugunda told the Daily Monitor newspaper.
"Here it comes," said Wafula Oguttu, founder of the independent daily newspaper The Monitor and now an opposition party spokesman. "The white journalists, they just get deported. But us, they will be sending us to Luzira," referring to Uganda's notorious maximum security penitentiary, acording to CTV.
Official sources said his critical reporting style upset senior officials already unhappy with international coverage of the state's prosecution of opposition leader Kizza Besigye. Donors who fund about half Uganda's budget – but cut aid after Besigye's arrest – were dismayed by Lambert's expulsion.
"This is the latest in a worrisome series of pressures on the press and arbitrary government action," one senior Western diplomat told Reuters. Last month, President Yoweri Museveni extended his 20-year rule at elections Besigye says were rigged.
Museveni, thought to be among a new crop of promising African leaders, has been criticised lately for authoritarian measures. Before winning last month's elections, he arrested and tried his main opposition leader, Kizza Besigye, for treason and rape. The president has also been criticized for stifling press freedom.
Andrew Mwenda, political editor at Uganda's independent Daily Monitor newspaper, said the government was looking for an excuse to deport Lambert.Lambert wrote a story last year for Salon, an online news magazine, arguing that Museveni's success story was a farce.
