Togo: Promises and the press

Press Code improvements will not guarantee greater liberty if authorities circumvent the code, as they have in the past, says a report on press reforms in Togo from the Committee to Protect Journalists. And while the government has promised political parties equitable access to the state media - the only media with a nationwide reach - there is reason to be wary of this guarantee as well. Togolese President Gnassingbé Eyadéma is Africa's longest-serving head of state whose ironfisted tactics and numerous human rights abuses led the European Union (EU) to suspend cooperation with Togo in 1993. But in Brussels in April 2004, the Eyadéma regime pledged 22 democratization reforms in a bid to get EU economic sanctions lifted.