Togo-Presse

Togo-Presse is the state-owned national daily newspaper of Togo, first appearing on 3 May 1962 (preceded by an introductory special issue on 26 April 1962) and becoming a daily from 1 August 1962, and the country’s state-owned national daily. The title was renamed La Nouvelle Marche under the Éyadéma regime from 29 November 1979 and later resumed its Togo-Presse identity. Published in French five days a week, Monday to Friday, the paper carries news, political coverage, government decrees, public notices and limited cultural and economic reporting; the masthead carries the standing designation “Grand quotidien national d’information”. Togo-Presse is produced and commercialised by the Société Nationale des Éditions du Togo (EDITOGO), a state publishing house.

Media assets

Publishing: Togo-Presse

Ownership and governance

Togo-Presse’s statutory architecture is more institutionally developed than that of the country’s audiovisual public broadcasters: the publisher EDITOGO is a Société d’État with directoire and conseil de surveillance under the 1990 reorganisation framework, rather than a direction sous tutelle of the ministry. The State holds the entirety of the capital, and the publishing house is supervised by the Ministère de la Communication, des Médias et de la Culture. The Minister is Yawa Kouigan who also serves as government spokesperson and succeeded the previous Minister Akodah Ayewouadan, who held the portfolio in the 2022-2024 period.

EDITOGO sits outside the Radio et Télévision du Togo (RTVT) merger framework advanced under Décret n° 2022-008/PR du 20 janvier 2022, which envisages only the consolidation of TVT, Radio Lomé and Radio Kara. As the publisher of the Journal Officiel, EDITOGO has a structural role within the executive’s communications and legal-publication architecture distinct from the broadcasters.

The current Director-General of EDITOGO is Rémy Banafey Assih (also rendered Rémy Assih Banafei), appointed by the government and in post over an unusually long tenure: he has been the publisher’s chief executive throughout the documented 2019-2026 period, with local press reporting from 2019 onward characterising him as retired-status with continually extended functions. Local press reports have repeatedly linked his tenure to labour-relations tensions, including disputes over wages, working conditions and union activity; specific claims about summary trade-union dismissals in July-September 2021 and police intervention at the company’s premises in July 2021 during a wage-and-conditions protest are documented in local opposition-aligned press and have not been independently audited. Rigobert Essosinam Bassadou holds the operational role of directeur de la rédaction (editorial director) of Togo-Presse, as evidenced by October 2024 newsroom-digital-skills training material from the publishing house. No arm’s-length board-recruitment procedure, public competitive recruitment process or independent appointment mechanism was identified for senior leadership at either EDITOGO or Togo-Presse during this review; the conseil de surveillance functions within the Société d’État legal framework but operates under the government’s appointment authority.

Source of funding and budget

Togo-Presse is primarily state-funded. SMM-baseline interviews with local media experts indicate that more than half of Togo-Presse / EDITOGO’s annual budget is financed by the state through public appropriations to EDITOGO, with the remainder drawn from newsstand sales, subscriptions and advertising; no public audited accounts were identified during this review to independently verify the current share. The publishing house has not released publicly audited annual financial statements for either Togo-Presse or its broader operations during the review period, and no separately disclosed Togo-Presse line item, revenue breakdown, circulation figures, staff budget or cost-efficiency benchmark, was identified in official budget documents or public procurement portals. The opacity is consistent with the broader pattern of Togolese state-media financial reporting documented by the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES) in its assessments of public-media accountability across francophone West Africa.

Editorial independence

Togo-Presse has no publicly available editorial charter, ombudsman, independent complaints procedure or arm’s-length appointment mechanism for senior leadership specific to the newspaper. SMM-baseline interviews with local journalists in May 2024 characterised the paper’s output as closely aligned with government messaging, with editorial alignment maintained through the combination of state-appointed leadership, budgetary dependence on public funds and the absence of institutional safeguards. The DG of EDITOGO writes regular signed editorials in Togo-Presse, as visible in the paper’s editorial archive, structurally aligning the publisher’s executive voice with the newspaper’s editorial line.

These structural conditions place Togo-Presse firmly in the State-Controlled (SC) category. Togo-Presse remains Togo’s state national daily newspaper, produced by EDITOGO, a state enterprise created as an EPIC in 1961 and transformed into a Société d’État under the 1990 public-enterprise framework. Although EDITOGO has a more developed legal form than the public broadcasters, the publisher remains under state control, supervised by the Ministry of Communication, Media and Culture, and closely embedded in the government’s legal-publication and communications architecture through its publication of the Journal Officiel. No arm’s-length appointment process, independent funding settlement, published editorial charter, ombudsman or Togo-Presse-specific complaints mechanism was identified. The SC classification therefore continues to apply for 2026.

AI and digital policy

Togo-Presse operates the togopresse.tg digital platform alongside its print edition, having since 2023 progressively brought its newsroom into digital-publishing workflows. EDITOGO’s general direction commissioned an October 2024 newsroom training on web writing and social-media production for the paper’s journalists and web staff, delivered by an external consultancy. No Togo-Presse-specific published newsroom policy on AI-generated content, synthetic-media disclosure, C2PA or content-provenance standards was identified during this review.

June 2026