A court in Somaliland sentenced the owner of Astan TV to five years in prison on Wednesday, November 3.
Yusuf Abdirahman, who has been behind bars for the last five months, will now spend the next five years in a prison in Hargeisa.
Other than the prison term, the Hargeisa court also slapped him with a fine of 2 billion Somaliland Shillings.
Additionally, his cable TV station has been banned from operating anywhere in Somaliland.
Abdirahman’s arrest led to plenty of unrest within the media fraternity in Somaliland with many activists accusing the government of frustrating and intimidating journalists.