Journalist says enough to trash ETV propaganda

Oct. 16 (ESAT News) A journalist who worked for the state-controlled Ethiopian Television and Radio Agency trashed his employer as propaganda factory on Facebook and announced his resignation.

Solomon Mengistu, who worked for the English section of Ethiopian Television for a few years, condemned lack of editorial independence. He lamented that journalists are being ordered to produce low quality trash propaganda instead of serving as real journalists.

He declared that he would never return to the “dirty propaganda factory” in a Facebook post. The journalist got so many comments and many commended him for having the courage to liberate himself from darkness.

In a statement that the Ethiopian Free Press Journalists Association issued last year, it reported that over 50 journalists that worked for the state media have fled the country and live in exile. CPJ on its part revealed that Ethiopia remained one of the top sources of exiled journalists in the world.

Nearly 200 Ethiopian journalists are estimated to have been forced into exile in the last decade due to brutal repressions including harassment and imprisonment.