18 October 2007
The year 2008 will usher in the 20th anniversary of the defeat, at Cuito
Canavale, Angola, of the South African Defence Force that was fighting
side-by-side with Jonas Savimbi's UNITA rebels. The defeat was at the hand of a
combined army of the People's Armed Forces for the Liberation of Angola (FAPLA)
and Cuba's Revolutionary Armed Forces. The armies had been engaged in deadly
combat, on Angolan soil, since 15 November 1987. South Africa's Defence Force
had invaded Angola, as it had done on a previous occasion.
Next year, maybe, we will analyse how the South African media reported that
defeat, given how a previous invasion and defeat of the invading force was
handled as I will show a little later.
The emphatic defeat of the apartheid force at Cuito Canavele opened the road
to freedom for the people of Namibia and, subsequently, South Africa. Movement
towards Namibia's independence was so swift after South Africa's Cuito Canavale
defeat that by May 1988, the Four-Party talks were underway in London. Those
talks culminated in the signing in December that year, at the United Nations,
of the South West Africa Peace Agreement
If you are asking the question - and I doubt you would do that - why I am
raising apartheid South Africa's forays into parts of the African continent on
the occasion of an event that is specifically designed to look at apartheid's
actions against our people in South Africa, it is because it is imperative that
we situate what happened on 19 October 1977, on the entire spectrum of the
apartheid policies and the escalation that was happening further to entrench
repression in the country. I also want to recall the responses to the
escalation, in the main, by the forces of change in our country and beyond its
borders, but particularly so on the African continent.
Those of us here tonight who were journalists at the time, will remember the
reluctance of large segments of the South African media, including what was
defined as the liberal press, to report on the invasion in 1975 of Angola by
the defence force. The denial of their involvement in war in Angola by the
South African government was swallowed lock, stock and barrel by the media
houses. In fact, one of the liberal papers at the time went on to pose the
question, in defence of the apartheid government in the face of doubt by the
people:
"Who will you believe: the government or the terrorists who were making the
wild claims against government?"
The paper went on to say it believed government and encouraged its readers
to do the same.
It was only after the defence force was driven out of Angola, on 27 March
1976, with its tail between its legs, that South Africans came to know the
truth about the invasion of Angola. But, the extent of fatalities was never
reported. None of the media houses boldly went out to research the matter and
tell South Africa how many of her sons died in that war.
The invasion, of course, was used to consolidate the political orientation
of the apartheid regime at the time. They were developing what was to be known
as Total Onslaught, a concept that was designed as a propaganda tool to
brainwash South Africans into believing their country was under siege from
communism. In that war, government's propaganda went on to say, no one would
survive, as communism would kill all in its wake: both black and white
people.
Captains of industry were terrified by the spectre of communism which
claimed Angola and Mozambique and the wealth in those countries that capitalism
would have continued to suck out until the countries were bare. Large parts of
the media bought the propaganda, thinking about their profits and fearing the
potential nationalisation, under communism, of the industry.
Government, riding the crest of the wave of support it was getting
especially from the white community and its entities, said communism was not
just on South Africa's borders; its tentacles were already inside the country
in the form of the struggling masses whose organisations were engaged in the
revolutionary project to liberate South Africa.
Some of those organisations, 18 of them, and some of their leaders were
banned. More than 70 of the leaders were arrested and detained without trial.
The World and its sister paper, the Weekend World were closed down. All of
those entities, including religious organisations were, according to
government, furthering the aims of communism.
A large portion of the journalists working for the two papers were members
of the Union of Black Journalists (UBJ) which was among the organisations that
were banned.
When the UBJ met in congress at Durban during the weekend of 7 to 9 October
1977, it already was an open secret to the delegates that the apartheid
government was preparing to clampdown on the union.
The UBJ was expanded and relaunched as a national entity in Johannesburg, in
1976. The Durban event in 1977, therefore, was the first congress of the union
in its new form. Before that the UBJ was basically a Southern Transvaal
organisation, whose membership came in the main from Johannesburg
newspapers.
The union took principled positions on a number of issues regarding South
Africa's social, economic and political equation. One of the most important was
the decision by the UBJ to define itself into the ranks of the struggling
masses of our country.
The union exhorted its members to cover the real South African story, the
story of repression and the people's fight against apartheid, the story of
deprivation and dehumanisation of all black people on the basis of their
pigmentation; the story of the harassment of all those who did not acquiesce
with their oppression. And the story of torture and death in detention; the
story of the kidnapping and killing of activists.
The position the UBJ had taken, the union members understood, was going to
pit them directly against the apartheid state. They knew, also, that for their
stories to see the light of day, they had to struggle against the news editors
who were white and living in fear of the advancing communist ogre.
Having placed themselves in the trenches of the revolution, the members of
the UBJ accepted that the reaction of the apartheid state would be fast and
furious against them. But, they possessed volumes of courage and were prepared
to face the onslaught from the state's security organs.
Our president, Joe Thloloe, was arrested shortly after the UBJ's council
meeting, in East London, at the beginning of 1977 but, every UBJ activity
thereafter was always pervaded by his indomitable revolutionary spirit.
The struggle in the newsrooms was a kettle of a different colour. We had to
be strategic. UBJ instructed its members to do the following to prevent the
news editors from willy-nilly spiking their stories:
* research the story properly, covering all angles and getting comments from
all role players
* present the stories in the best form possible, paying particular attention to
the credibility of the content and
* use language that would be the best medium in the circumstances properly to
communicate with the readers.
The clampdown on 19 October 1977, although flabbergasting and deserving of
the condemnation it received at home and abroad, had been preceded by a more
horrifying incident when, on 12 September 1977, the state's security forces
killed one of South Africa's beloved sons, Steve Biko. By that time, the
apartheid state was escalating its repression, using arrests, detention without
trial, torture and assassination, to force the struggling masses into
submission. But the struggle for freedom continued unabated.
Because we were anticipating action against the UBJ, we put in place a
structure that would take over immediately when the banning order was served.
It formed the nucleus of what emerged publicly as the Writers Association of
South Africa (WASA). In 1980 we expanded WASA into the Media Workers
Association of South Africa (Mwasa), to include all black media workers at the
various components of the media houses.
The more the signs were becoming much clearer that the apartheid regime was
being choked by an international community that was becoming more hostile, the
more the regime further escalated repression, sending its army and the police
into the townships to try to quell the fire of revolution that had been lit
across the country. But, the youth, at school and outside school raised their
level of activism. The workers, mobilised in unions, became more militant. The
new situation allowed the people's organisations that were banned in 1960 to
root themselves among the people to build their underground structures.
The UBJ, fighting as it did from the revolutionary trenches of our people,
was also fighting for the freedom of the media as a key component of
democracy.
Today, that freedom is recognised in the country's Constitution where the Bill
of Rights recognises freedom of religion, belief, opinion and expression,
including freedom of the press and other media, and freedom to receive or
impart information or ideas.
Upward mobility is part of the social construct that defines human
interaction and endeavour. It stands to reason, therefore, that some of the
journalists who were members of the UBJ would leave the media and pursue other
fulfilling careers, while others would become senior managers and executives in
the media. I followed fulltime a political path and subsequently became a
Minister.
I hope, though, that wherever those journalists are, they have not lost the
teachings of the Union of Black Journalists, especially diligence and honesty
in the collection and imparting of information. UBJ's principle on the proper
writing of stories was not time bound. It should still apply today and should
be the lodestar of all practising journalists.
We must be truthful, though, and admit that there is a lot of carelessness
these days in the way that stories are handled and there have been examples of
sloppy journalism that passes as information to the public.
In the early period of his Presidency, especially in 2000, President Thabo
Mbeki became a target of criticism, led mostly by the media. Many angles and
arguments were used to back up the criticism. One element of the criticism that
was sustained over time was that he was anti-democratic. Two elements of the
anti-democratic tendency, the media and members of the parliamentary opposition
argued, were that:
* he was undermining Parliament by his regular absence from the House and
that
* he was so undemocratic that he had shifted his office, without consultation
with anyone, from Cape Town to Pretoria.
At the time, I was the President's Parliamentary Counsellor. I responded to
two newspapers that had even run editorials on the matter, the East London
Daily Dispatch and the Mail and Guardian. Both papers did not publish my
letter. In fairness to them, I may have been a bit arrogant in my response and,
perhaps, my piece deserved to be ignored.
My point of departure was:
* was surprised that there were journalists in South Africa, especially
editors, who did not know that the South African president, in terms of the
present Constitution, is not a member of Parliament. That stipulation is
carried in Chapter 5, Section 87, where it is indicated: "When elected
President, a person ceases to be a member of the National Assembly and, within
five days must assume Office by swearing or affirming faithfulness to the
Republic and obedience to the Constitution"
My view was that anyone who writes about parliamentary processes must know
the rules and regulations that relate to those processes. But, the same
ignorance was displayed by the media going to the 2004 general election. There
was some speculation that the President would appoint Kgalema Motlanthe as the
country's Deputy President.
Kgalema was not on the list of those who would be parliamentarians. And the
Constitution says: "The President must select the Deputy President from among
the members of the National Assembly."
Equally surprising to me was the alleged shift of the President's office
from Cape Town to Pretoria. But, since 1910, South Africa has been governed
from Pretoria. Over the years journalists have referred to the South African
government as either Pretoria or the Pretoria government. Reports of the
shifting of the President's office from Cape Town to Pretoria, as an
anti-democratic tendency nogal, was to me very odd, but even weird when
editorials appeared on the matter. My response to that allegation was that,
early on in our education we were taught, in a subject called Civics, that
South Africa had three capitals. The legislative capital was Cape Town;
Pretoria was the administrative capital, while Bloemfontein was the judicial
capital.
Pretoria continues to be the administrative capital. The President, of
course, has an office in Cape Town, at Tuynhuys. He uses that office when
Parliament is in session because cabinet and cabinet committees sit in Cape
Town during that period.
One of the tasks I found on my table when I assumed duty in the Ministry for
Safety and Security was an enquiry relating to farm attacks. There were a
number of questions from the parliamentary opposition that I had to field on
the matter.
Out of the blue, one newspaper ran a report and an editorial claiming that
the enquiry had been completed and the relevant report had been handed over to
me. I was not publishing it because it was such an indictment against
government that I was busy doctoring it. No sources were mentioned to back up
the story. I approached the newspaper, among other things to ask if they had
spoken to the person who was heading the enquiry. They had not.
Recently, the country's newspapers led the attack on the President and
government on the Judge Moseneke's recommendations on the salaries of the
president and the executive. It was one of the most virulent attacks on the
president and the executive. But, none of the newspapers, from the editors to
the reporters, had checked whether the president had accepted the Moseneke
recommendations.
There are other examples I could mention but, it is not my intention to do
that at the moment. There may be other opportunities in the future that will
create space for us to interrogate the matter more exhaustively. I do want to
say, though, that what I have already indicated and other examples in future,
shows how much there has been a gravitation away from the principles of
journalism of checking out stories and sources and reporting both sides of the
matter. Not being in the industry, I don't know why journalists act as they do
sometimes.
I worked for the East London Daily Dispatch at some point in my journalistic
life. Around the walls of that paper's newsroom there were banners that
screamed down at the reporters in the newsroom: "Don't chance it; check
it!"
How I wish that was the slogan of all journalists today in honour of such
giants of the industry in the past like Henry Nxumalo, Nat Nakasa, Can Themba,
Ruth First of Fighting Talk, the Guardian, New Age, Spark, Zeke Mphahlele,
Casey Motsisi, and Juby Mayet, just to mention a few of those luminaries.
Journalists have a responsibility robustly to interrogate the information
they get so that when it is placed before the public it is a truthful account
in every respect. Journalists must be penetrative in their search for stories
and must record the result of their research without fear or favour. But, they
must be driven all the time by a desire to get at the truth and not be
sidetracked by the need for quick wins that often slip into falsity. Debate
that is sparked by the media as they record the South African story must be
factual and not fallacious. The springboard for developing the country must be
the truth.
Issued by: Secretariat for Safety and Security
18 October 2007
