It’s remembered as Black Wednesday, a day in October 1977 when the apartheid government banned a number of publications and arrested journalists. Thirty-seven years on South Africa is free, but for the media the price of that freedom is constant vigilance, writes Daily News reporter Mphathi Nxumalo
Almost 37 years ago to the day, then
minister of justice and police, Jimmy Kruger, banned The World, Weekend World and the Christian publication Pro Veritate.
The World editor Percy Qoboza and scores of other journalist were thrown into jail for six months without trial. Others were forced to go underground.
The apartheid state’s clampdown on critical media voices, coming barely a month after Black Consciousness leader Steve Biko was killed in police detention, had a chilling affect on journalists.
South Africa today is a free country and rights of expression enjoy constitutional protection, but because the press serves as a mirror for society and a watchdog of our rights, journalists are on a knife-edge.
What we reflect is not always a pretty picture and pressure from the powerful remains a reality for journalists and prompts the question:
Has the media faithfully carried on the baton from the likes of Qoboza?
Beyond the country’s borders, media freedom faces many threats and reporting at time comes with a great personal risk and cost to the journalist.
An example is the death of American journalist James Foley. Islamic State militants executed him in August.
Another was Russian Andrey Stenin, who was killed in the same month while covering the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
The Star photographer Ken Oosterbroek was killed while covering the 1994 pre-election violence and SABC reporter Calvin Thusago was stabbed to death by a mob in Sharpeville on April 23, 1993.
These are just some of the more extreme examples of the type of sacrifices journalists have paid for their craft, all in an effort to tell society what is happening.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, an international organisation that promotes press freedom, 40 journalists have been killed so far this year and 211 were imprisoned internationally last year.
For the journalist, this also means they are not able to make telephonic contact with friends or family because conversations could be recorded by intelligence agencies.
Gavin MacFadyen, the director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism at the University of London, said there has been a regression in terms of media rights because “pressures on journalists have intensified”.
MacFadyen said a primary cause of the regression was the lack of an opposition culture in politics, which affected the press. “Self-censorship is the most effective form of censorship… journalists are even scared to take on the police.
“There has not been a good investigative piece of journalism in the mainstream American press for the last 10 years.”
He said the best way to counter the trend would be for journalists to be fiercely independent and tell the truth.
“Your reputation rests on telling the truth.”
It is this truth that journalists relentlessly pursue in stories, but this does not mean that we are infallible.
Mistakes are made. Which is why we have institutions like the Press Ombudsman to correct our mistakes.
Juby Mayet, one of the journalists who was banned on Black Wednesday 37 years ago, said: “Things have improved somewhat from those days of apartheid.”
She said the media today was different from what it was then.
“In my day we had a goal. There was a purpose in our writing.”
Mayet said in modern-day South Africa, journalists did not seem to have a specific goal when they wrote articles.
“Journalists have lost the ability to communicate with people on the ground,” said Mayet.
She said social media played a role in the disconnection between journalists and people.
She said journalists no longer went to taverns or pubs to talk to people and find out what was happening in their communities
Mayet said conversations in places such as pubs and parks could serve as an inspiration for a story idea.
She said the secrecy bill posed a threat to media rights because it would restrain journalists in practising their craft.
“Power can lock you up, but it can’t lock up your mind” said Mayet.
Photojournalist Benny Gool, who the government tried to force to testify in Rashaad Staggie’s trial in the early 2000s, said there was progress in medium freedom.
“We are a lot more free to do what we want now. There is still room for improvement, though,” said Gool.
He said journalists received far more support these days than in the past.
Gool said there was a lot of “juniorisation” of newsrooms. Young journalists were entering the industry because they wanted a “free ticket”.
Right2Know organiser in KwaZulu-Natal, Free State and Mpumalanga, Joanne Adams, said: “There is no progress in terms of media rights”.
She said the media has also been corporatised and was engaged in “sunshine” journalism, instead of telling stories that were pertinent to people.
“There are so many stories in the townships that people need to know about.”
She said a reason for the change in journalism was that before 1994 many journalists were activists who wrote on issues that affected people, but modern journalists were not necessarily activists, which reflected in the issues they wrote about.
The media have an obligation to tell the story of people to the people. But this is not always possible for a variety of reasons – from negligence to government or corporate oppression.
Even with these constraints, however, the task for all journalists is clear: to tell the truth at all costs.