Johannesburg - In what appears to be a resuscitation of efforts to establish the dreaded media appeals tribunal, the media has come under heavy scrutiny from the ANC-led alliance, with the SACP expected to reopen the debate about media regulation this week.
The party is also expected to call for the scrapping of the deal involving SABC archives between the public broadcaster and pay TV heavyweight MultiChoice.
The SABC/MultiChoice deal came for particular criticism at the alliance summit this week, with alliance leaders describing it as the privatisation of what should be the country’s national archives.
The SACP is expected to call for the establishment of an “independent body” to regulate the media, describing the current regulation of the press as largely ineffective.
This criticism enjoys widespread support across the ruling alliance and is contained in the ANC’s 2012 Mangaung conference resolutions, which called for Parliament to investigate the establishment of a media appeals tribunal.
The SACP’s eagerness to reopen the debate comes hot on the heels of comments by Communications Minister Faith Muthambi in April that the communications portfolio committee should act on the issue of a regulatory system for print media.
Muthambi alluded to the parliamentary inquiry into the establishment of a media appeals tribunal as indicated in the Mangaung resolution of the ANC.
ANC treasurer-general Zweli Mkhize on Saturday became the latest senior leader in the tripartite alliance this week to question the fairness of South African media following earlier criticism from leaders of the alliance including ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe and his deputy, Jessie Duarte, and SACP general secretary Blade Nzimande.
According to the SACP’s discussion document for its special national congress starting this week, the South African media is seen as part of a “liberal anti-majoritarian offensive against the ANC, its alliance partners and the government”.
“Recommendations were made to challenge the Naspers monopoly of pay TV and to intensify the struggle for independent regulation as opposed to self-regulation of private print and electronic media.
“Consideration should also be given to forming a broad coalition of the progressive forces that stand for the transformation of the media for a democratic South Africa, and further to expose the anti-majoritarian agenda of most media,” reads the document.
Speaking after the alliance summit this week, SACP general secretary Blade Nzimande said the media in South Africa wanted to be the only sector that was not independently regulated.
“We want to reopen the issue of self-regulation by the media. We think that it is totally inappropriate. We want to argue for independent regulation of the media.
“It cannot be that everybody is subject to independent checks and balances and then you have a section of the society which is so influential… but only intends to do self-regulation.
“It’s not an alliance position, it’s an SACP position,” said Nzimande.
“In that context we will raise the issue of the SABC, and we will raise it with the minister and we are pleased that we share the same concerns – not only as the SACP but as the alliance,” he said.
Nzimande also raised the issue of the racist comments often seen on the comments section of online publications.
“You cannot tolerate online what you cannot tolerate on your print edition. This is part of the agenda that we are calling the anti-majoritarian liberal offensive, which has now taken the form of a regime change agenda,” he said.
These comments also come as the ANC and its alliance partners prepare for the party’s national general council due to take place later this year.
But SA National Editors Forum deputy chairman Moshoeshoe Monare warned this week that the issue of media transformation should not be conflated with “some people’s desire to control the media”.
“What we have in South Africa is not self-regulation, but co-regulation instead.
“Members of the public and newsmakers have plenty of remedies to pursue if they feel aggrieved by what the media publishes.
“We have also seen editors being more responsive in terms of grievances. The media is not above scrutiny and even our courts are able to step in in cases of defamation,” said Monare.
He said the model was working, and that even Mantashe had acknowledged as much following an incident involving the ANC and the Daily Dispatch newspaper.
“We cannot have a situation that when politicians disagree with certain sections of the media, they call for state regulation of the media to suit their own political agendas,” said Monare.
ANC treasurer-general Zweli Mkhize, addressing the SANEF annual general meeting on Saturday, also raised concerns about the media, saying its criticism of the ANC had to be “without bias”.
According to Mkhize, a lot of reporting in South African media displayed “an attitude” towards the ANC instead of facts.
Mkhize told the meeting that media transformation had been discussed extensively at the alliance summit.
The Sunday Independent