Commissioner
4 November 2007
On Sunday, 21 October 2007, the London Sunday Times published an article by
RW Johnson titled: 'Press targeted in Thabo Mbeki's paranoid war.'
The article claimed that President Mbeki ordered the arrest of Sunday Times
editor, Mondli Makhanya. It proceeded to market more falsehoods about the
President, the government and other issues currently in the public domain.
The article was subsequently published in Australia, Canada and other
countries throughout the world.
Our High Commissioner in the United Kingdom, HE, Lindiwe Mabuza, wrote a
response to the London Sunday Times in which she disputed Johnson's falsehoods,
communicating the facts as they exist in objective reality.
The response was sent to the Sunday Times on Monday, 22 October for
publication on Sunday, 28 October. The paper did not publish the response.
The High Commission last week inquired whether the Sunday Times would
publish the response. The paper verbally, it consistently failed to respond to
the High Commission's written communications, informed the High Commission that
it would not publish the response because the content of RW Johnson's article
had been published in South Africa. The Sunday Times also informed the High
Commission that it has conveyed the response to Johnson and insofar as it was
concerned, that was sufficient.
We have taken the unprecedented decision of releasing this statement because
the London Sunday Times' conduct has prejudiced the truth. It is similarly a
patent contradiction of the principles of fairness, objectivity and free speech
to which it purports to subscribe.
The paper's conduct has left begging many questions, among them: what does
freedom of speech entail? Do those about whom the media are surely entitled to
comment not have a right of reply?
We invite people to read the High Commissioner's response on our website:
http://www.dfa.gov.za
For more information, please contact:
Ronny Mamoepa
Cell: 082 990 4853
Response to the London Sunday Times
By Lindiwe Mabuza, South African High Commissioner to the United Kingdom
(UK)
22 October 2007
In your last edition, 21 October 2007, you published an article on South
Africa by RW Johnson under the scary title 'Press targeted in Mbeki's paranoid
war.'
The article is a veritable and highly toxic witches' brew of deliberate
fabrications to which we must respond in plain English. The simple fact is that
RW Johnson's article is made up of a bundle of lies.
I will now list these lies.
Lie No 1: Mondli Makhanya, editor of the Johannesburg Sunday Times faces
arrest for 'exposing the minister of health as an alcoholic.'
Lie No 2: the Minister of Health threw tantrums at the hospital where she
underwent a liver transplant operation, demanding wine and whisky.
Lie No 3: the Minister 'received the new liver because of her government
position.'
Lie No 4: the Minister of Health called for AIDS to be treated with garlic
and beetroot instead of antiretroviral drugs.
Lie No 5: President Mbeki ordered the police to investigate a case against
Makhanya.
Lie No 6: 'investigators' have been instructed to find 'dirt' on Makhanya
and 'his reporting team.'
Lie No 7: President Mbeki views the (Johannesburg) Sunday Times with
venom.
Lie No 8: the SABC (South African Broadcasting Corporation) is 'as obedient
to government fiat now as it was under apartheid.'
Lie No 9: the SABC has 'denounced the rest of the media for not being
sufficiently pro-Mbeki.'
Lie No 10: a nationwide security crackdown is under way, with journalists
and political activists being spied upon.
Lie No 11: there is a climate of fear and suspicion in the country 'like we
haven't seen since apartheid days.'
Lie No 12: the former Deputy Minister of Health, Madlala-Routledge was
sacked because she visited 'an Eastern Cape public hospital.'
Lie No 13: the government has presented Madlala-Routledge a bill 'for every
expense she incurred during her years in office, in an obvious attempt to
bankrupt her.'
Lie No 14: 'plans are afoot forcibly to change press ownership.'
Lie No 15: President Mbeki has 'sacked as untrustworthy anyone who shows
anything but slavish deference.'
What are the facts with regard to some of these matters?
Fact No 1: the medical file of the Minister of Health was stolen from a
hospital in Cape Town and the electronic record at the hospital deleted.
Fact No 2: the stolen document ended up with the Sunday Times, which then
published a story about the Minister of Health, ostensibly based on what is
contained in this document.
Fact No 3: the National Health Act prescribes that patients' medical records
are private, and makes it a criminal offence to publish such records without
the permission of the person concerned.
Fact No 4: it is an offence to receive stolen goods.
Fact No 5: as required by our Constitution and the law, the South African
Police Service (SAPS) is investigating all possible criminal misdemeanours
relating to the matter of the medical files of the Minister of Health: the SAPS
has stated categorically that there are no impending arrests in this
regard.
Fact No 6: nobody in our country is above the law. Where criminal
misdemeanours have occurred, the law must and will take its course, regardless
of who is involved.
Fact No 7: the doctors who carried out the liver transplant strongly
objected to the baseless suggestion that they acted in any way outside
internationally accepted medico-ethical principles: the opposition Democratic
Alliance retracted the false allegation it made in this regard.
Fact No 8: Madlala-Routledge was removed from government because she knowingly
defied a written instruction by the President not to travel to Madrid to attend
a conference on Aids vaccines, a subject about which she is entirely
ignorant.
Fact No 9: the money that Madlala-Routledge has been asked to return to
government relates to unauthorised and therefore illegal expenditure of public
funds, for which she was responsible while she was Deputy Minister both at
Defence and Health: correctly, the Chair of the parliamentary Public Accounts
Committee has announced that if such unauthorised expenditure occurred, it will
help ensure that the affected tax-payers' funds are returned to the public
coffers.
Fact No 10: all interceptions of private communications by the state
agencies for purposes of gathering intelligence have to be authorised by a
judge of the High Court, who must be satisfied that such interception is
justified: the suggestion that in this regard we are back to the apartheid days
is entirely malicious.
For many years RW Johnson has waged a media campaign against our government,
presenting himself as the great defender of democracy in our country, whereas
we, who sacrificed everything to bring about that democracy, threaten the very
democracy we fought for.
Johnson is at liberty to continue along his merry way, masquerading as an
expert on South Africa. But not even he should be allowed to propagate blatant
lies about our country, as in the article under discussion, resulting in the
entirely false headline in your newspaper that press freedom in South Africa is
threatened by a fictional paranoid war waged by President Mbeki.
Issued by: Department of Foreign Affairs
4 November 2007
