The newspaper created two committees: one focuses on questions linked to ethics and the second focuses on the newspaper’s editorial orientation.

The two committees relaunch Fraternite Matin’s editorial policy and break its orientation which was considered pro-governmental.

"On 9 December, Fraternite Matin will have its 38th anniversary. It did not change its editorial line. It rectifies the interpretation which was made, to propose a newspaper which gets off propaganda and off political party journalism. In other words, a newspaper in which all political, cultural, religious, sports and geographic sensibilities are considered, more than in the past," says Afred Dan Moussa, director of the newsroom.

The Committee of Ethics includes two people outside the newspaper and three people belonging to the group; two journalists as well as the enterprise’s chief of the legal and litigation service. The Committee’s mission is to apply a code of honour for the journalists of the group. The editorial staff is required to avoid politics, not to accept payment to write favourable articles, etc.

"The Committee of Ethics is a moral court. It takes care of the good image of the group," says Mr Dan Moussa.

The Editorial Committee is composed of three outside people, central chief editors and the newsroom’s director who is the president. Its role is to increase the influence of the editorial line at Fraternit Matine, to contribute, thanks to regular columns and editorials, to the life in the newsroom.

The committees will help position the newspaper as a medium independent from any political orientation or pressure. Fraternite Matin also endorsed a new slogan - "neither neutral nor partisan" - to support the two bodies.

Because of the attempted coup, the editorial relaunching coincided with a rigorous treatment of information. "In the name of Fraternite Matin’s credibility and of the sensitive aspect of information during a crisis period, we chose to handle with particular care all the information that appeared in the newspaper," says Mr Dan Moussa.

To accompany the creation of the committees, Fraternite Matin raised the frequency of its editorial meetings. "We have chosen to sleep at the work place, instead of running home under excuse of the curfew, and we came from two editorial conferences to three: one at 2:00 am after the closure of the newspaper, besides the traditional reunions of 8:30 am and 6:00 pm. The additional exchanges and discussions allow us to reduce the risks of possible errors," he says.