ALGERIA / A presenter on Canal Algérie sacked from the news

On February 27^th Ahmed Lahri, presenter of the 7:00pm News on the public Canal Algérie, was officially removed from the channel, a decision confirmed the next day by the Minister of Communication, Hamid Grine.

Lahri is accused of having “spoken the name of Abdelaziz Bouteflika [President of the Algerian Republic] without mentioning his title” during the news programme of February 22^nd.

Tewfik Khelladi, head of EPTV, the public broadcasting group which includes Canal Algérie, said Ahmed Lahri had not been suspended but had “left the news programme to join the [channel’s] editorial staff.”

Meanwhile Hamid Grine has said that “all official global media are subject to a work ethic specific to the public domain”, and felt that the journalist, who has been reprimanded in the past for the same reason, “owed the respect to the President of the Republic by specifying his title.”

Sources : TSA Algérie, Jeune Afrique