A Rwandan journalist is reported to have arrived in Britain to claim political asylum. According to the Rwanda news agency, Elenues Akanga was detained for 24 hours after arriving in London last week and then released pending a decision on his application. He was apparently provided with a lawyer to help him fight his case.
The agency quotes a source who said: "He is free now but under surveillance. If you want more information you can mail him." An official with the British embassy in Kigali said it had no official information from the foreign office in London about the case.
Akanga has a history of clashes with the Rwandan authorities. He was fired from a daily paper, The New Times, after writing a story about the abuse of journalists in Rwanda. A source at the paper said Akanga was assigned by his editors to write the story but took sole blame when the piece offended members of the establishment.
He then joined up with two other journalists - Sulah Nuwamanya and Julius Mwesigye - to launch the Weekly Post, which was banned and closed after just one issue. The three men then lobbied in vain for the reopening of the paper.
I will attempt to discover more about Akanga's asylum case. Meanwhile, it should be noted that the New York-based press watchdog, Committee to Protect Journalists, issued a report in June, Journalists in Exile, which found that nine Rwandan journalists have been forced to flee the country.
