Politics reporter Luyolo Mkentane recounts the tongue-lashing he received from ANC deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte for Independent Media’s coverage of the SABC saga.
The dimunitive ANC deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte was probably a school playground bully growing up.
How else can I describe the unnecessary abuse she dealt me in her Luthuli House office on Monday afternoon, except bullying? Without any cause, I was belittled, harangued and accused of pushing an anti-ANC agenda. Her attitude was harsh and brutal is an understatement.
Read: #Hlaudi at SABC 'is a threat to fair poll'
I had gone to the ruling party’s headquarters, situated across The Star building in central Joburg, to give Duarte a hearing after she demanded her “right of reply” regarding our coverage of the ongoing crisis at the SABC (no matter that she doesn't lead or work for the latter).
But when I got there, she demanded that I explain remarks that Karima Brown, group executive editor of Independent Media, allegedly made about the volatile situation at the public broadcaster.
When I responded that Brown was best placed to answer for herself what she really meant, Duarte lost her cool, and boy was I at the receiving end of her unbridled wrath.
She gave a torturous lecture on the ANC's struggle for liberation, spewing facts in quick succession as if to back up her claims about the ANC's credentials. I was forced to sit there and listen to her, like a small naughty boy being reprimanded in in the headmaster's office.
Duarte roared: “One of the accusations Ms Brown made was that the ANC is using the SABC. We didn’t understand the context of the accusation but if you do know it, you could just tell us the context, we would like to respond.”
An angry Duarte then gave me a lesson on the Press Code, which I know off by heart.
When I wanted to know what had driven the ANC to have its Damascus moment on the SABC crisis – the party has now changed its stance on the broadcaster and has called for a probe on chief operating officer Hlaudi Motsoeneng’s powers - Duarte burst out laughing.
“Can I stop this?! Listen, I’m not into David and Goliath and religious Damascus stuff. I’m not there. Really?! I don’t play those games either with journalists!” She gave another belly laugh and continued: “I think the best we should do is issue out a statement because I think here we’re going to waste our time. You’ve got a particular thing in your head and it’s anti-ANC, and we don’t have an anti-you or anti-anyone position.”
The ramble continued: “We are a national liberation movement. We have 1.4 million paid-up members in our organisation; 16 million people voted for us in the last election.
We are not a small Mickey Mouse party. You’re not talking to kids on the corner! You are talking to a governing party! And we are a serious governing party, we don’t play children’s games!”
She wasn't done: “We disagree with your perspective of innuendo and analysis that is not actually based on facts, but based on your clouded opinions of one or the other individual, as the media.”
Then she trained her guns yet again on her real target, Karima Brown: “She has a right to her opinions but her opinions cannot mean that she casts aspersions on the African National Congress or accuse us of using the SABC for the governing party’s own ends,” she thundered.
Then she accused Independent Media, again with no respect for evidence, of “supporting” an unnamed political party against the ANC: “Therefore our right of reply to the Independent is that you cannot simply make negative aspersions on the ANC because you have chosen a different political party to support.”
I tried my best to return the “discussion” to the original point, the SABC. I asked Duarte to give her analysis of Motsoeneng’s leadership at the SABC. She shrieked: “Excuse me, sir?! I’m not going to go there. You’re looking for mud! Why don’t you ask Mr Motsoeneng to answer that? I’m not his spokesperson either! I am only giving you the policy perspective of the ANC, OK?! Why does Karima (Brown) send people to play games here? I don’t understand, yeses, man!”
Duarte’s colleague who sat on the table with us looked embarrassed by what was transpiring, and tried to offer one or two words of sympathy on my way out of Duarte’s sixth-floor office.
The Star’s editorial staff could not believe when I relayed the hell I had just returned from. Duarte’s clouded message was clear: Go tell your boss what I have just said!
One senior journalist even joked: “You should have looked her in the eye, smiled and delivered the two power keys: You know just where to get off!”
@luyolomkentane
Political Bureau