On Tuesday, a high court in Somaliland lifted the ban on the fiercely independent Hubsad newspaper.
The government had banned the newspaper for five years.
Consequently, Hubsad went to court asking for the lifting of the ban. The matter had been before the court for more than a year.
In 2016, Said Khadar Aw Abdillahi and Abdirashid Nur Wa’ays, the Editor-in-Chief and founder of the newspaper respectively, were arrested.
After spending five days in the custody of the Criminal Investigation Department, they were released.
In mid-2016, they were arraigned in court.
However, Hargeisa Regional Court found them not guilty of the crimes for which the government had charged them.
Consequently, the court lifted the ban slapped on it by the government.
Nevertheless, the Attorney General appealed this decision at the Appellate Court, which endorsed the lower court’s decision on May 7, 2017.
Subsequently the Attorney General appealed the matter further at the high court, which ruled that the ban on the independent newspaper has to be lifted immediately.