The Legal Adviser of SNPP, Reagan Kaputa, said that Congolese journalists and media workers are affected by the 2002 Labour Code and the 2023 Press Act in relation to their work. While speaking on the issue of contracts for journalists, Kaputa emphasised that the employment relationship is defined in a contract signed between the employer and the worker, setting out the job description, basic pay, and social benefits in accordance with the minimum wage, collective agreements as well as the duration of the contract and the conditions for terminating it. He noted that from a legal perspective, ‘the contract protects the employed journalist against job insecurity. It therefore goes without saying that a journalist/employee who does not have a properly signed contract is exploited’.
Reagan Kaputa highlighted that the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) signed and ratified ILO Convention 87 in June 2001 and ILO Convention 98 on 16 June 1969. Thus, ‘our laws provide for the protection of workers against all acts of discrimination aimed at undermining trade union freedom’. This means that access to employment cannot be made conditional on membership of a trade union neither should any sanction be envisaged on a worker who has participated in trade union activities after working hours or during working hours with the employers’ authorisation.
The Vice- President of SNPP, Denise Saye, said that journalists in the DRC continue to work in a precarious situation. ‘Several forms of violence have been recorded including assaults, kidnapping, arrests, torture and murder with impunity. Women journalists on the other hand are confronted with various challenges including sexual violence in the workplace’. Despite the fact that several laws have been promulgated to defend the rights of workers most of these laws are not implemented. She called on the Congolese authorities to guarantee the safety and security of journalists especially during the election period.
The Director of the IFJ Africa Office, Pa Louis Thomasi, in his Solidarity Statement, said that media employers have deliberately continued to pay journalists starvation wages despite the fact that they continue to reap huge profits. ‘Media employers who refused to give contracts to journalists, or pay salaries that are beyond the minimum wage or deliberately refused to sign collective agreements with the union or flout the collective agreements that they have signed must be challenged in a competent court of law. He called on the SNPP executive to design recruitment strategies that would target young journalists working online as well as freelance journalists.
The two- day workshop dilated on numerous themes including the working conditions of journalists online and offline; laws guaranteeing the rights of workers in the DRC, freedom of association, the right to organise and collective bargaining; ILO Convention 190 and the Decent work Agenda; Gender equality in the media and sexual harassment and the safety and security of journalists.