situation, people prefer not to expose themselves to risks, as one should protect his/her own physical integrity. Situations of misuse or abuse of power in areas away from Maputo should be promptly denounced to avoid the wide spreading of unlawful and illicit actions. For instance in 2006, a prosecutor ordered the illegal detention of three journalists in Barué, in the Manica Province. However, as soon as MISA-Mozambique denounced the occurrence the journalists were released and the Public Prosecutor (Procurador-Geral da República – PGR) brought a disciplinary action against the said Prosecutor. SCORES: Individual scores: 3; 5; 3; 3; 2; 3; 2; 2; 4; 2 Average score: 2.9 1.3. There are no laws restricting freedom of expression such as excessive official secret or libel acts, or laws that unreasonably interfere with the responsibilities of media. Analysis: There are laws that restrict the Freedom of Expression in Mozambique. One of such laws is the General Statute for Public Workers, (EGFE), preventing or thwarting public workers from speaking in public about their own work. Such provisions contribute towards the proliferation of unnamed sources in media reporting. Such provisions differ from law nr. 30/2001, which states that public workers shall cooperate with journalists in as far as access to official sources are concerned. The Media Law (Press Law) also has some excessive provisions. For instance, article 29 (1) and (2) of this legal monument, regarding the official sources of information, are contradicting each other, one (1) states that access must be facilitated while (2) talks about consent. It is worth little to facilitate without consent. Other areas of the Media Law (Press Law) considered to be problematic are Article 42 (on crimes of media abuse) stating that media crimes are of an urgent nature, and Article 47, stipulating that when the plaintiff is the Head of State, there is no evidence in relation to the veracity of the facts, which is unreasonable. In the draft amendment bill of the Media Law (Press Law), this article is in the process of being deleted, given that Article 153 of the Country’s Constitution of 2004 stipulates that the State President is liable for criminal acts committed during his/her office, a provision that was not included in the 1990 Constitution which served as a basis for the approval of the Media Law. It was decided that the good thing, in as far as the media crimes was concerned, was that many of those that were calumniated in real terms did not know the Media Law. Journalists should be aware that a Code of Conduct for Senior State Officials – involving ministers, provincial governors and district administrators – has provisions expressing that those mentioned above are not authorised to refer to their work outside official premises. There is another concern in as far as media crimes are concerned: the judges pronounce judgements against journalists guided almost exclusively by penal code thus completely ignoring the Media Law provisions. SCORES: Individual scores: 2; 2; 2; 2; 2; 2; 2; 2; 2; 1 Average score: 1.9 So This Is Democracy? 2007 -177- Media Institute of Southern Africa