Close Menu
Market Data Newsletter
Sunday, June 28
Global Free Speech

Burundian journalist Sandra Muhoza provisionally released after nearly 2 years

News RoomBy No Comments2 Mins Read181 Views
Burundian journalist Sandra Muhoza provisionally released after nearly 2 years

Listen to the article

0:00
0:00

Kampala, March 04, 2026—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the provisional release of journalist Sandra Muhoza and calls on Burundian authorities not to oppose her appeal of her conviction. 

On February 27, the public prosecutor at the court of appeal in the northern Ngozi region directed Muhoza’s release on the condition that she remain in the province, report regularly to authorities, and not “obstruct the investigation” or “cause scandal by her conduct,” according to a copy of the release order reviewed by CPJ. Muhoza was released on the afternoon of March 4. 

Muhoza, a journalist with the privately owned online newspaper La Nova Burundi, was arrested in April 2024, and in January 2026 she was sentenced to four years in prison. She was convicted on charges of undermining Burundi’s territorial integrity and inciting ethnic hatred in connection to comments she made in a journalist WhatsApp group. Her appeal against the conviction is ongoing and she is expected back in court on March 20 for a verdict. 

“While we are very pleased that Sandra Muhoza is out of prison, her provisional release does not undo the injustice she endured,” said CPJ Africa Program Coordinator Muthoki Mumo. “Sandra Muhoza will only be truly free when she is exonerated through Burundi’s legal system. Her conviction should be overturned and she should be allowed to return to work without further harassment.”

Muhoza had initially been sentenced to 21 months in prison in December 2024. However, a May 2025 court of appeal ruling found that the previous proceedings had been carried out by a court without jurisdiction, effectively overturning her conviction. She remained behind bars and authorities initiated new proceedings against her on the same charges in October 2025. 

During her imprisonment, Muhoza was reported to be suffering ill health that affected her ability to walk. In December 2025, 127 African women journalists wrote to Muhoza, expressing solidarity and calling for her release.

Burundi remains a challenging environment for journalists. CPJ research has documented repeated prosecutions of media professionals under anti-state charges, as well as harassment and physical attacks against reporters.

CPJ did not receive immediate responses to requests for comment sent via messaging app to government spokesperson Jérôme Niyonzima.

Read the full article here

Fact Checker

Verify the accuracy of this article using AI-powered analysis and real-time sources.

Share.

The FSNN News Room is the voice of our in-house journalists, editors, and researchers. We deliver timely, unbiased reporting at the crossroads of finance, cryptocurrency, and global politics, providing clear, fact-driven analysis free from agendas.

Related Articles

Global Free Speech

Photo by: Stephen Barnes/Medical/Alamy UK news this week is dominated by a damning report led by senior midwife Donna Ockenden that reveals how more than 500 mothers and babies were harmed or died at maternity units in Nottingham. This isn’t the first scandal Ockenden has investigated. A few years back terrible failings were revealed in Shropshire hospitals run by the Shrewsbury and Telford NHS Trust where 201 babies and nine mothers died.  We spoke to Ockenden for the magazine and she repeated this: “women aren’t listened to”. Another common thread was cover-up. Secrecy is not a one-off, it’s a pattern, wrote Martin Bright when he reported on the Shropshire scandal for Index. As Bright said, “this is not a historical story; it is an ongoing crisis”. Maternity scandals happen not only in Britain but all over the world. Last year’s protests in Morocco were ignited after eight women died in a maternity ward in Agadir because of severe medical neglect. In Egypt last week Omnia Sweidan, a former resident physician in obstetrics and gynaecology at Alexandria’s El-Shatby University Hospital, wrote a Facebook post detailing a series of abusive incidents faced by women at Alexandria’s Al-Shatby Hospital. It was read and shared by tens of thousands. Within 24 hours of posting, instead of the government declaring an investigation, security forces arrested Sweidan. While she was apparently later released, she’s been accused of spreading false news and misusing social media. She could end up in jail. Meanwhile, Afghanistan has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world – the figures of deaths and injuries are rising, but to what no one really knows. The Taliban won’t publish the data, probably to cover-up the true numbers. I’ve navigated maternity services myself in the UK. I’ve generally had good experiences and I’m very grateful to the NHS. But my experiences have not been uncomplicated – my daughter very nearly died. What saved her, I’ve been told, were a few factors – my race (white), my class (middle), where I live (London) and the fact that I relentlessly badgered those at my local hospital for weeks on end saying things didn’t feel right. Let me be clear here though: one shouldn’t have to be a dogged white Londoner to get good medical care. And a recent health committee report revealed terrible inequalities faced by people who are members of ethnic minorities, stating that “[B]abies that are Black or Black British Asian or Asian British have a more than 50% higher risk of perinatal mortality”. At Index we typically work on stories where dissidents take on the powerful: leaders, oligarchs and tech bros. The victims of maternity care scandals might not appear the same. But there is much that unites them. At the end of the day if the response you get from a doctor or nurse to a basic medical request is a shrug or a sneer, your free speech is being violated. If the systems view calls for accountability as dissent that must be silenced, then they are censoring. We grew up being told we’re lucky, that childbirth was one of the leading causes of death before the advent of modern medicine. For many of us that’s true. Just not all of us. That’s a travesty demanding urgent attention – in Nottingham and beyond. READ MORE

Add A Comment

Comments are closed.