STATE OF PRESS FREEDOM IN SOUTHERN AFRICA 2022 CPJ reported on the brutal assault in February 2022 of journalist Nomthandazo Maseko by correctional officers in Matsapha, a town about 22 miles from eSwatini’s capital Mbabane. Maseko, a reporter for the privately owned news website Swati Newsweek, was livestreaming a protest by members of the Swaziland Liberation Movement (Swalimo) activist group outside the local prison, where two pro-democracy members of parliament have been held since their arrest on July 25, 2021. In Malawi, the apprehension of Gregory Gondwe, the founder of the Platform for Investigative Journalism (PIJ), was precipitated by the organisation’s exposé on payments endorsed by the attorney general to a businessman for contracts that were nullified due to fraudulent machinations. During Gondwe’s six-hour detainment, the authorities interrogated him about his sources. Despite the safeguards provided by Malawi’s access to information legislation, which endeavours to protect journalists’ sources, the police proceeded to search the PIJ’s premises, Journalist Gregory Gondwe (centre) leaves police custody accompanied by his wife Edith (right) PIC CREDIT: Teresa Chirwa-Ndanga 8 confiscating Gondwe’s electronic devices, and compelling him to divulge his passwords. This trespass and seizure flagrantly breached Article 21 of the Malawi Constitution, which enshrines the entitlements to media freedom and privacy. A mere 10 days after Gondwe’s arrest, PIJ’s website was hacked, which the Malawi chapter of MISA (MISA Malawi) condemned as “a serious attack on journalism, a violation of the right to access information, and a criminal offence under the Electronic Transactions and Cyber Security Act of 2016”.(8) Malawian journalists faced sustained threats during 2022. According to MISA Malawi, followers of a convicted church pastor attacked Times Group journalist Tiyese Monjeza and others reporting about the pastor’s case at the Mulunguzi magistrate’s court in Zomba City in April. The authorities arrested, convicted, imprisoned Monjeza’s attacker. and In July, demonstrators in Lilongwe assaulted Times Group cameraman Emmanuel