Back-down is a victory for South Africa
The following article was published in the Leadership magazine
Some distinctive victories are encapsulated in the decision by the ruling African National Congress (ANC) to revise and water-down the controversial Protection of Information Bill. However the battle is still not finally over, while the entire affair is also symptomatic of a wider problem – the long-standing acrimonious relationship between the ruling party and the media.
The positives from the latest development are:
- It gives a powerful message that constitutional democracy in South Africa is working;
- It strikes a major blow against corruption in the public sector; and
- It to some extent reaffirms the role of the media and so-called whistle-blowers to report on and to expose corruption and other ills wherever they are found. There is still howeverapparently no plan for explicit protection against prosecution under the intended legislation.
The acrimonious relationship between the media and government was highlighted during the past week by remarks made by government spokesman Jimmy Manyi about the media and a subsequent meeting between editors and Minister Collins Chabane in the Presidency.The ANC backed down on some of the draconian elements in the bill, also known as the Secrecy Bill, after unprecedented opposition to it from civil society, including from its biggest ally, the Congress of SA Trade Unions (Cosatu) and even from within its own ranks. Also important is that the ANC realised the bill might face a challenge in the Constitutional Court which some opponents had threatened.
After what started as a relatively narrow but determined opposition campaign, largely driven by the media, it quickly snowballed into the massive Right2Know campaign involving more than 400 organisations and 16,000 concerned individuals.
It was feared the wide scope of the bill would curtail media freedom and freedom of speech, remove transparency in the affairs of government and create a secure blanket for government corruption. It also triggered negative foreign investor perceptions and international opposition.
In its to-be-revised form the bill will now only apply to the intelligence and security services and will no longer allow civil servants and all state institutions to declare their activities a state secret.
Opponents of the bill had warned it would allow officials to hide corruption and other transgressions by making it virtually impossible to obtain and publish information deemed “secret”. The bill also threatened journalists and whistle-blowers with jail sentences of up to 25 years.
In a statement the Right2Know campaign said the ANC’s change of heart “may signal a willingness by democrats within Parliament and government to push back against an apparent grab for power by securocrats within the state”.
The turn of events demonstrated clearly that constitutionality remains a key cornerstone of the way in which South Africa is governed. It also showed that there is ample constitutional space for civil society to make itself heard when a ruling party is deemed to abuse its parliamentary majority and its powers.
But the affair has also been symptomatic of a much deeper running and long existing problem in South Africa, namely the ever tense relationship between the media and political authority.
In fact, a tendency among rulers in South Africa to shoot the messenger started as far back as the 1820s when two newspapers run by poet Thomas Pringle and fellow Scotsman John Fairbairn, the South African Journal and the South African Commercial Advertiser were suppressed by the British colonial government at the Cape.
The tradition of conflict between the government and the media further surfaced in the pro-Afrikaans language and anti-British sentiments driven by the newspaper Die Afrikaanse Patriot after 1876.
During the apartheid-era rule of the National Party (NP) this conflict reached a new low point when the NP government tried to gag and shut down opposition newspapers.
Most recently the ruling ANC has conducted a virulent campaign against the very same media that had been one of its strongest allies in the struggle against apartheid. This campaign manifested itself in ANC leaders condemning the media for publishing stories about the corruption charges against its leader, President Jacob Zuma (the charges have since been dropped) and accusing the media of conducting a “trial by media”.
It has also resulted in scurrilous attacks on publications and individual journalists by the likes of Julius Malema, president of the ANC Youth League (ANCYL) and its spokesman, Floyd Shivambu among others.
The anti-media campaign came to a head in an ANC policy decision in 2007 to implement stronger state control over the media, giving rise to attempts to create a regulatory Media Appeals Tribunal. However, again following concerted opposition, the ANC backed down in January this year but insisted that the existing press council must reform and include the imposition of fines for journalists making mistakes, among other things.
Last week controversial government spokesman Jimmy Manyi, known for his tense relationship with the media, also climbed into the media causing further deterioration. He accused the South African Editors’ Forum (Sanef) of “cartel-like tendencies” for raising cocerns over his plans to centralise and control all future government advertising.
After a meeting between the editors and a Government Communication and Information Systems (GCIS) delegation led by Manyi broke down badly two weeks ago, the editors met Minister in the Presidency Responsible for Performance Monitoring and Evaluation, Collins Chabane on Friday with both sides resolving to take steps to improve relations.
