Cameroonian journalist assaulted in Congo

A Cameroonian journalist working for a private television near the Congolese power was assaulted in Brazzaville, affirmed on Friday by reporters without restraint, denouncing this act of violence.

"On the night of 9 to 10 September, the journalist Elie Smith of MNTV has been the victim of an aggression at his home, during which his sister was raped", writes the defense organization of the press in a press release.

According to RSF, Mr. Smith was assaulted "by four heavily armed men, dressed in civilian clothes but wearing rangers of the police. Once the house was completely looted, the sister of Elie Smith was taken away in a house and raped" before that the assailants did take the leak, adds RSF.

According to hospital sources contacted by AFP, the sister of the journalist was still hospitalized on Friday of the suites of this aggression. MNTV, the television channel for which Mr. Smith worked, belongs to Mauritius Nguesso, elder brother of the Congolese president Denis Sassou Nguesso, in power since 1997 and is suspected of wanting to change the Constitution in order to seek a new mandate in 2016.

According to RSF, he criticized Mr. Smiths freedom of tone in which he has demonstrated in his weekly program "The Great Interview", who "bother the power". "For the confreres of the journalist", the aggression to which it has been a victim "would have been sponsored by elements of the police near the power", writes RSF.

The NGO urged the Congolese authorities to "act in the shortest possible time in order to stop the aggressors and to identify their sponsors". "The aggression of Smith is shocking.

It shows that the rule of law and freedom of expression do not exist yet in Congo", deplored Mathias Dzon, one of the leaders of the Congolese opposition, at a press conference. The Republic of Congo occupies the 82nd place, on 180 countries, in the world ranking 2014 of freedom of the press established by RSF.