Pius Njawé

On 12 July 2010, Cameroonian journalist and director of Le Messager Pius Njawé  died in a car accident in Chesapeake, Virginia, US. Arrested over 100 times for his reporting, Njawé won several awards for his work, including the 1991 CPJ International Press Freedom Award and the 1993 Golden Pen of Freedom. In 2000, he was named one of International Press Institute's fifty World Press Freedom Heroes of the previous fifty years.

Njawé was born in Babouantou, Cameroon, on 4 March 1957. As a child, he sold newspapers in the street before going on to work for the state-owned newspapers La Gazette and the daily Douala Express. In 1979, at the age of 22, he founded the nation's first independent newspaper, Le Messager.

The paper soon became known for its criticism of long-time President Paul Biya, and it drew a strong government response. Njawé was arrested for the first time in 1981, and would go on to be arrested about 125 more times before his death. In 1990, Le Messager was briefly seized by the government for its reporting on a riot. In 1990, Njawé's publishing of an "open letter" to Biya led to another arrest.

The paper was banned in 1992, forcing Njawé into a short exile in Benin, where he continued to publish. Njawé returned to the country in February 1993 despite being accused by the government of drug dealing, counterfeiting, and sedition; he founded the Cameroon Organization for Press Freedom one month later. In 1996, he was imprisoned on charges of "insulting the president and members of the National Assembly".

In 1998, Njawé was sentenced to two years in prison when Le Messager ran an article suggesting that Biya had a heart condition. The sentence for running this article was later reduced, and due to pressures from Human Rights groups, Njawé was pardoned after almost a year in prison. His wife had miscarried in the interim, reportedly due to mistreatment by prison guards. Njawé wrote a book about his prison experience titled Bloc-notes d'un Bagnard ("Notebooks of a Convict"), which he published in 1998.

Njawé's wife Jane was killed in a car accident in September 2002, causing him to found an organisation calling for safer road conditions in Cameroon. He had eight children.

Shortly before his own death in a car accident, Njawé told an interviewer that "A word can be more powerful than a weapon and I believe that with the word... we can build a better world and make happier people. So, why give up while duty still calls? No one will silence me, except The Lord, before I achieve what I consider as a mission in my native country, in Africa and, why not, in the world."

(Source: Wikipedia)

Selected publications

Médias audiovisuels et tolérance administrative au Cameroun : enjeux communicationnels et logiques d'acteurs / Simon Ngono. - Paris : L'Harmattan, [2021]

Autoritarisme, presse et violence au Cameroun / Alexie Tcheuyap. - Paris : Karthala, cop. 2014

Incisive journalism in Cameroon : the best of "Cameroon Report" (1978-1986) / Sam-Nuvala. - Mankon : Langaa Research & Publishing CIG, cop. 2014

Mass media and democratisation in Cameroon in the early 1990s / Francis Beng Nyamnjoh. Mankon : Langaa Research & Publishing CIG, cop. 2011

Pius Njawe (1957-2010) : portrait posthume d'un journaliste de combat / Thomas Atenga.
In: Politique africaine 2010/3 (N° 119), pages 207 à 215

La liberté de la presse écrite au Cameroun : ombres et lumières / Erik Essousse. - Paris : L'Harmattan, cop. 2008

50 ans de journalisme : les médias africains depuis l'indépendance du Ghana / Elizabeth Barratt; Guy Berger. Johannesburg : Le Forum des éditeurs africains, Highway Africa et la Fondation pour les Médias d'Afrique de l'Ouest, 2007

Médias et pouvoir politique au Cameroun : les journalistes face à la santé présidentielle / Norbert N. Ouendji. - Marseille : Les belles pages, cop. 2006

Bloc-notes du bagnard : prison de Nwe Bell Douala - Cameroun / Pius N. Njawe. - Paris : Éditions Mille et une nuits, [1998]

Cameroun : Le combat du Messager. Entretien avec Pius N. Njawe.
In: Politique africaine 1985 (N° 19),  pages  87 à 90
https://www.persee.fr/doc/polaf_0244-7827_1985_num_19_1_3771

See also: Pius Njawé : La justice camerounaise est instrumentalisée contre les journalistes, Jeune Afrique TV, 28 avril 2010

Timeline of Cameroonian journalists via DBpedia and Wikidata