Yemeni newspapers brought to their knees

In Yemen, the press continues to be a victim of conflict. Several newspapers have been forced to stop publication, reports IMS’ media coordinator in Yemen

In some countries, media prosper from the political battles raging in a country with ample stories to report, increasing sales and a widening circle of readers eager to follow developments. But in Yemen, the press has been a victim of the conflict.

Since the outbreak of the peaceful revolution for change, the civil society media and independent print press have worked to provide press coverage, but have nonetheless seen a decline in distribution after becoming the targets of campaigns to cut off circulation at border security points to provinces.

Newspapers closing

The escalation of the conflict has meant that weekly newspapers have suffered considerable losses over the past months by being unable to reach their readers and permanently losing a large share of their readership.

Due to the insecure investment climate, newspapers have been unable to secure much needed advertisers for their papers due to the conflict. Furthermore, many advertisers in the private sector have not paid newspapers for ads that have already been run. For most newspapers, advertising is their main source of income.

The lack of electricity as the conflict carries on, is another impediment to the publication of newspapers on time. Electricity generators are not a solution because of the lack of petrol and diesel to run the generators.

Last week, the newspaper “Al-Masdar” could not publish on time due to power cuts. Over the last three months, when print copies have been available, a large number of these were seized at the security checkpoint entrances to major cities. This, coupled with the lack of ads and the failure of previous clients paying for their advertising space has brought the paper to its knees financially. Its board of editors has announced that it may stop issuing weekly paper copies until the situation has improved.

Many other newspapers have followed suit. The civil society newspaper “Witness” last week announced that it would cease publication for the same reasons. Similar announcements followed from other newspapers such as “Al-Dyar” and the “Al-Nidaa”, “Al-Thawry” ( Newspaper of the social party) and “Al-Yaqeen”.

In the coming weeks, readers will find newspaper stalls empty with the exception of government newspapers which have in fact also lost readers as the revolution against the regime develops.