Paper newspapers in Mauritania ... a struggle for survival

Salik Zaid-Nouakchott

A decade ago, my relatives Ould Aminah used to buy paper newspapers that were published in Mauritania, looking for news, press stories and good articles for Mauritanian writers.

Today he remembers his last newspaper, that was in 2013, and remembers its main topic. The newspaper was only the newspaper "Al-Akhbar" and the prominent topic in it was an investigation titled "Diplomacy in Mauritania ... Diplomacy without Diplomats."

Since then, my wife Amina, a young journalist, has stopped buying paper newspapers. He says that any important newspaper article he finds on its website after two days saves him from buying it. He adds to Al-Jazeera Net that some of his favorite newspapers have stopped publishing permanently.

Regular newspapers no longer exceed the ten headlines, they fight for survival and suffer between a ghastly spread of a website and the anvil of poor funding and support from the state.

Faced with this reality, the Publishers Union announced a strike to issue newspapers that are still resisting to protest against raising the prices of the national printing press, which is the only one capable of printing newspapers of acceptable quality, according to the federation.

In this context, the president of the Press Publishers Union, Moussa Samba Si - who founded the French-language newspaper "Le Cotidien" - said that the strike was a response to the mismanagement of the allocations of the Press Support Fund, which is supposed to be intended to increase the capabilities of the press institutions.

Moussa adds to Al-Jazeera Net that the fund did not give the national press its allocations of support this year, which negatively affected newspapers in terms of raising the costs of printing.

He considered that the strike on publishing is considered one of the steps that the Publishers Union will take, including contacting the direct officials of the Press Support Fund in order to pressure the fund.

Corruption and dilution
For his part, Mohamed Ahmed Al-Mustafa, editor-in-chief of the independent newspaper Al-Akhbar, believes that the authorities have expanded the press sector in the country, by opening the doors for everyone to create websites.

And Mustafa confirms that dilution and corruption have reached the most severe in the field of journalism, as the Press Support Fund announced the support of 111 electronic newspapers, and adds: We can not find now in Mauritania up to ten newspapers.

He adds to Al-Jazeera Net, "You cannot keep silent on the public money wasted by the Press Support Fund, which it divides into sites and newspapers that are not present on the ground."

A reign
In light of the control and accessibility of electronic news sites, as well as television and radio channels, citizens in the capital did not care about the daily newspapers' release, nor did they feel their absence.

Sidi Mohamed, one of the merchants, who is 60, sells clothes at the crossroads of "Averco" - one of the most famous places in the heart of the capital - he told Al-Jazeera Net that with the acceleration of news and events, he could no longer wait for the publication of the newspaper.

The 20-year-old Abdullah Masoud, a university student, does not remember the last time he bought a paper newspaper. He says it is out of the question right now, because all the news is available on the mobile screen.