The new press law is being slammed, writes Mohamed El-Sayed Ever since President Hosni Mubarak promised journalists more than two years ago to abolish the article in the press law which says journalists will be jailed for slander, they have been waiting for its cancellation. But they will have to wait indefinitely after the government this week sent a draft law -- which includes the same imprisonment sentence -- to the People's Assembly to be passed next week. The move drew harsh critique from the press, whether state-affiliated, opposition or independent. In a desperate attempt to prevent the law from being enacted, many papers will reportedly not appear on newsstands on Sunday. Makram Mohamed Ahmed wrote in the daily Al-Ahram : "I don't know why the government didn't keep President Mubarak's promise to cancel imprisonment sentences for journalists. It insisted added a new article to the draft law stating that journalists must be jailed if they wrongly accuse people of gaining illicit money." The introduction of this article, Ahmed continued, could be possible if journalists have easy access to information that should support their articles. "This item will place a cloak of secrecy over the truth, which is an obstacle in the way of freedom of press and the right of people to know the truth." Ahmed Taha El-Naqar mocked those who were optimistic about the new law being amended. In an opinion piece in the daily independent Al-Masri Al-Yom, El-Naqar deemed "naïve those who thought that the government had harboured good intentions towards [journalists and judges] or was willing to reach a fair formula for the new judiciary or press laws." It's illogical, he said, to think that "a corrupt government that facilitates corruption and supports corrupt people will issue a law that supports the press in exposing corruption cases." El-Naqar predicted that if the new press law is passed by the People's Assembly, "newspapers can do nothing but shut their doors and close down". Rifaat Rashad opined in Al-Masri Al-Yom, "at a time when the Press Syndicate has been fighting to abolish all imprisonment articles in the press law, journalists were surprised by this new article which is explicitly aimed at protecting corrupt people who steal public funds. And despite the fact that the head and board of the syndicate drew the government's attention specifically to this article, it turned a blind eye." Rashad said that he, along with many other journalists, met several times with government officials, and "we didn't hear anything except nice words. But at the end we found what we always feared." The outspoken executive editor-in- chief of the Nasserist Party mouthpiece Al-Arabi, Abdullah El-Sennawi, went as far as saying, "there are some officials who want to limit freedom of expression and freedom of the press. They want to enact a law that shields corruption. They want to turn all publications into government bulletins praising its achievements that have never been made and turning a blind eye to widespread corruption." El-Sennawi argued that some decision- makers and senior officials "abhor journalists and the press, for they believe that a free press has paved the way for protests and demonstrations against the president." Meanwhile, the case of the editor-in- chief of Al-Dostour Ibrahim Issa, in which he was given a one-year sentence for publishing a complaint in his weekly independent accusing President Mubarak of misusing government funds, continued to make news. In an interview with the opposition daily Al-Wafd, Issa, who said he was certain he will be imprisoned in October, criticised the regime for introducing the new law. "This law is a disaster that has befallen the Egyptian press. It doesn't only send journalists to prison but will never let them leave. It's a fascist law. Egypt is one of only four backward countries in the world that sends journalists to prison."
