Anas Aremeyaw Anas: Meeting the journalist behind the mask
From exposing corruption government officials to quack shamans, investigative journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas has done it all. His latest expose on corruption in Ghana football infamously led to the death of one of his colleagues. Now he is providing a haven for journalists who are under pressure on the continent.
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00:00 There are lots of young people who are interested in becoming you, like you.
00:05 I mean exposing corruption in their countries.
00:07 But there are obviously a lot of challenges.
00:10 Talk to them about some of the risks that investigative journalism,
00:16 undercover investigative journalism faces.
00:19 Nobody should think that coming into journalism is a bed of roses.
00:24 It is not.
00:26 You are going to be attacked.
00:28 You are going to be sued.
00:29 In the football scandal, I was sued 66 times.
00:34 But here is the trick.
00:35 If you stick to hardcore evidence, no matter the suit,
00:40 no matter the number of people who sue you, truth will stand.
00:45 It's all up to making sure that you check your security very well.
00:50 You don't become trigger happy in just talking and mentioning things that you do.
00:58 You ensure that you follow very simple techniques that I can't explain in this interview.
01:03 But it is difficult, but there is a way of surviving it.
01:08 And I think that African youth has that capacity to survive the storm.
01:14 In any case, if we don't solve our problems, who is going to solve it?
01:17 Are we expecting German journalists to fly into our country to help us solve it?
01:21 Certainly not.
01:23 Across the continent, there have been several journalists who have been abducted,
01:26 who have been killed.
01:27 Would you still encourage the young people to get into this space where people are being killed
01:32 and you have to hide your face constantly because people are coming at you?
01:35 Certainly.
01:37 See, we cannot take the freedom of the press for granted.
01:43 And the fact that you have your freedoms does not mean that you should go to sleep.
01:48 That is what we ought to be reminded of as journalists.
01:54 You see, when we become complacent and we think that the freedom we are enjoying was
01:59 delivered to us on a silver platter, that's when we begin to suffer.
02:02 How do we rally ourselves together when our brother is under attack?
02:06 Because if you don't shout today, tomorrow is coming to you.
02:12 The Whistleblowers and Journalists Safety International Center, what is that all about?
02:18 Well, WatchSick, Whistleblowers and Journalists Safety International,
02:22 is aimed at housing African journalists who, in the face of trouble, have nowhere to go to.
02:29 You see, in view of the role I play on the continent, many journalists who face persecution
02:37 are the first point of call.
02:39 And I've been hosting them for the past 10 years now.
02:43 So this time, I decided I want to officialize it so that I can have a permanent shelter
02:48 where these people will come and take some respite when they are under attack.
02:53 And you recently also embarked on a project, the Arizona Project in Cameroon,
02:57 where you are picking up on the story that was covered by a journalist who was murdered.
03:03 Do you care to share more on that?
03:05 The Arizona Project is our colleague, Martinez.
03:09 Now, Martinez is a colleague.
03:10 The way we are sitting here and talking, that's how I talk to him.
03:13 We got up one morning, he was shot dead.
03:16 Those who come after journalists should know that the fact that you've taken down one journalist
03:21 does not mean that we are sitting down.
03:24 Now, we've managed to come together, we've managed to look for resources
03:28 so that if you killed anybody, it doesn't matter where, we will put ourselves together.
03:33 I lead that Arizona Project, and I can tell you, it's very effective.
03:38 And apart from mine, there are several other journalists across the world
03:42 who are also keen in helping exposing the bad deeds of people who killed journalists.