Dear Jeremy,
I am deeply disappointed in the South African Communist Party and in you personally for supporting censorship in the form of a media tribunal. You have lost my respect as an intellectual and as a democrat.
The occasion for my letter is your article in Umsebenzi Online. I would respond directly online, but the SACP website does not allow me to do so, and perhaps this is symbolic.
Let’s call the media tribunal by its proper name, censorship, and not sanitise it with terms like “independent regulation of the news media” or other euphemisms. Together with other proposed protection of information legislation it is a worrying development.
The Constitution will probably not allow a media tribunal, but that is not the point.
The point is that you have lent your authority to this sinister attempt to stifle free speech, without looking at the law, and without seriously examining the record of the Press Ombudsman. It is intellectually shoddy to write on such an important issue as news media freedom without doing some basic, real research.
It is galling that you and the party have ignored the fact that the news media is already ruled by law in several respects.
There are quite rightly limitations on what you or I or the Sunday Times can say. Apart from prohibitions on hate speech, crimen injuria and defamation law curtail our complete freedom. These are part of our law.
Moreover, any journalist writing about a commercial entity must be aware there is the possibility of substantial damages being awarded for loss of profits.
Why is a media tribunal necessary when laws already exist to discipline journalists and non-journalists?
You pose the same question. “So what about the courts? Civil action against libel needs, of course, to be an option, but it is costly, prolonged and often inconclusive.”
It is true that the poor have difficulty suing for defamation, but generally the law favours the rich. This is a bigger problem than can be solved by a media tribunal. Because it is expensive, the Ombudsman exists to give some recourse to those who want to bypass the courts.
A media tribunal could not use the informal methods now employed by the Ombudsman, and the Appeal Panel attached to it. Legal representation is not allowed at the Ombudsman and Appeal Panel hearings, and oppositional legal tactics are discouraged. It’s more like an arbitration.
To be fair and just, a media tribunal would have to be a highly formal affair, with legal representation allowed for both parties. How is that better than the current system of the courts or the Ombudsman process?
You say in your Umsebenzi Online column that journalists should not be jailed, or fined, but newspapers should be fined instead.
As an intelligent man, you must know that you cannot simply fine newspapers without affecting the journalists who work for those newspapers.
The effect, at the very least, will be to make at least some newspaper proprietors and their employees look over their shoulders, to make them more timid. I have already seen this happen during the apartheid years at English-language South African newspapers. I thought we had left this era behind.
And it is clear that newspapers, because they may at times serve the Opposition, because they are commercially driven, are the target.
Few newspapers could afford to be fined regularly. The resulting climate of fear would mean mainstream newspapers would take few risks, and citizens would have to resort to the internet or some other source for real news.
Talking of the internet, what about regulation of websites? The SACP frequently uses Umsebenzi Online to prosecute its interests, for instance its battle against former treasurer Phillip Dexter. Will that be subject to regulation? Could one take the website to the tribunal?
At the moment, there isn’t even space to leave comments on the website, something all newspaper sites now make space for.
You can write letters to newspapers, and one of our finest journalists, Max du Preez, has done just that to plead with the ANC not to introduce a tribunal.
In a letter to Business Day, he writes: “As frustrated as I sometimes am, as a veteran of 35 years in journalism, with some of the reporting and trends in the media, I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that the proposed tribunal will not improve journalism in SA.”
Of course, our journalism is not exactly spotless.
Your take is that with “profit maximisation, then we will tend to get exactly what we are often getting. Trashy tabloids aimed at the working class, and acres of middle-class whingeing in what passes for serious journalism. In short, journalism that panders to the lowest common denominator in its target audience”.
As a former professional journalist, I am also not always happy about what the news media focuses on, the behaviour of some of our reporters, and the effect of commercial pressures on quality, but you and I know that censorship will not help.
I direct you to the amusing and thought-provoking play by former journalist Tom Stoppard, Night and Day, which is a superb examination of the issues of press freedom.
In the play, the idealistic young reporter Jacob Milne says: “Junk journalism is the evidence of a society that has got at least one thing right, that there should be nobody with the power to dictate where responsible journalism begins.”
By contrast the fictional, LSE-educated dictator in the play believes the press should be, like his government-owned Daily Citizen, “responsible and relatively free”.
He asks another journalist, Dick Wagner: “Do you know what I mean by a relatively free press, Mr Wagner? … I mean a free press which is edited by one of my relatives.”
The logic of your support for a media tribunal in your online column, Jeremy, is nowhere so flimsy as in your deduction that a recent plethora of newspaper apologies proves that self-regulation is not working.
Surely that newspapers run apologies, sometimes spontaneously and without the intervention of the Ombudsman, means that self-regulation is working?
An absence or paucity of apologies would show that self-regulation is NOT working.
Newspapers and journalists, even the best, make mistakes. The mistakes range from the merely embarrassing to the career-threatening, from minor errors of judgement to serious defamation.
No journalist likes to be sued, but no normal journalist is happy to see any apology appear for a story he or she has written. Trust me on this.
However, you say that apologies are insufficient and that fines are necessary.
It has become clear that the biggest single threat to freedom of speech in the UK and now elsewhere in the world is the heavy fines that are levied there for libel, so much so that the UK has attracted a kind of “libel tourism” by wealthy non-residents availing themselves of UK law to sue.
You do not, however, have to listen to me, since I am a former member of the Press Ombudsman’s Appeal Panel.
Listen instead, to an activist who was also jailed by the apartheid regime, Guy Berger, who has eloquently laid out the fundamental reason for opposing a tribunal, in his Converse column: “You can’t increase state power over what may be published and still argue that your country has media freedom.”
Or listen to Du Preez again: “I am appealing to the many ANC members of influence, who know in their hearts that this campaign is not actually about so-called ‘brown-envelope’ or irresponsible journalism, to stand up and stop this reckless effort to undermine the freedoms of all South African citizens.”
I can only urge you to regain your instinct to “speak truth to power” and to entrench democracy by not acquiescing and instead actively oppose any further attempts to subvert freedom of speech.
Yours sincerely,
Reg Rumney
What did you expect from the wanne be Joseph Stalin. Cronin and Blade are sychophants !
They never contested an election in their own parties name….and now its pay back time, pens for hire
Bravo, Reg! Beautifully argued!
Unfortunately, it is part of Communist dogma that the Press should be the propaganda arm of the government. Cronin’s argument that the real problem is the profit-making by newspapers demonstrates that money trumps freedom in the eyes of SACP, hence the emphasis on fining the publishers as a way of forcing them into self-censorship.
Likewise, Cronin’s argument that the tabloid press somehow takes advantage of the ignorant and gullible masses would be laughable if it weren’t for the fact that the ANC Alliance have kept the masses ignorant and gullible through their own policies of dumbing down education and controlling the national broadcaster.
I suspect that no more than 10% of our population ‘get’ what democracy is all about. To most it’s just a word, and one they would be helpless to explain beyond “It means I can vote for the ANC”.
As a result of the Constitutional crisis the ANC Alliance is provoking, I re-read some essays on freedom of thought, expression, and the press written by Thomas Paine and John Peter Zenger over 200 years ago. One of Paine’s arguments in favour of unfettered freedom of expression seems particularly apposite in our present circumstances:
“He who would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from oppression. For if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.”
Translation: The laws you pass now could be used against you in future…
Reg dont be naive, Communist parties world over when in power have practised censorship 100% so why not here where they jointly rule: Jeremy and his comrades/bosses will be sniggering at another “useful idiot.”
Better volunteer to be on the “independent” panel that censors Umsebenzi Online.
Brent
I don’t buy comrade Cronin’s reasoning, since it is based upon a false premise.
The wrangling goes on and on about the powerless in our society not having access to due process through the justice system.
It is claimed they become victims of a rampant media who trample all over their rights and assault their ‘dignity’ with impunity, knowing full well that the victims enjoy no meaningful legal recourse.
Surely universal justice is the primary and foremost responsibility of the state, before all others, its very raison de être?
An admission by the government that is unable to protect people from specific harms despite having a whole gamut of laws already in place for that very purpose is an admission of a failure to do its job.
Besides which, people who do not have access to the justice system for the expeditious resolution of violation of their person and property, whether by private or public persons do not have ANY rights de facto upheld by the state, since the justice system constitutes the only avenue through which redress may be sought.
Rather than fix the justice system, a political quick fix is resorted to and a muzzle slapped upon the media to paper over the real problems.
The cost/benefit of applying censorship, from the government’s standpoint, is rather more favorable than the arduous task of implementing effective justice for all.
@Reg Rumney – A democratic communist or a communistic democrat? Sorry, does seem to alter the end producct. I know that Tolstoy would have been moved to write a thought provoking yet funny story about this concept. Perhaps titled: waiting for comrade president.
SAdly everything above is true. I studied the Russian Revolution and Hitler in depth. Their use of the press were one and the same. Stalin killed 20 million and Hitler over 6 million.
Would you go with either philosophy? Or should we remain free and alive! No-one should be constrained by those whom he/she has elected for they are our servants to make our country work
The dreaded Media Tribunal is just but one of the scattered pieces of the puzzle that when they eventually come together will provide for a deadly cocktail of repressive regulatory regimes and we will be firmly en route to dictatorship. Liberation movements across the continent riding on bottomless sentiment blindsided their citizens by passing repressive laws in the name of consolidating “democratic gains” and by the time their sinister motive came to light, they threw the rule book at their own, replacing former oppresses with even more deadly consequences.
On the other hand I’m not really surprised with Jeremy Cronin’s rather intellectually deficient contribution; he’s been hyped-up and overrate for an inordinately long time now. In fact the collective intellectual capital of the entire SACP has been zero-rated. It would be interesting to hear what COSATU has to say on this.
I like Cronin even though he is an incorrigible communist. His article sounds very reasonable and he has a point when it comes to the fact that the media does often enough sacrifice true facts for sensationalism. The media should avoid leading us by the nose – isn’t that exactly what the ANC alliance is already doing albeit for different reasons? I am somewhat bemused at Cronin’s stance; the media has been quite friendly to the SACP on a number of issues. Nevertheless, I consider a free, and I mean free, press as the best guarantee for a democratic SA even if they write rubbish. I am also quite happy if they keep on rubbing the ANC’s face in the dirt as long as it is based on fact. In fact, you have to be blind not to see the scavenging opportunism and general incompetence of the ruling party. And correctly exposing this has obviously drawn the ANC’s ire. If there is any good left in the ANC they should heed Max du Preez’s call and so regain some respect.
Jeremy has always struck me as the ” outside the group of popular boys and desperate to win favour” sort of chap. He is naive and I sometimes feel sorry for him ; his eager to please behavior is sometimes quit pathetic. I therefore cannot respect this latest offering from him as it seems to fall into this catergory of behaviour. In his heart he must realise the real motivation of the ANC for this clampdown on the media, but then he just can’t help himself……has to earn some brownie points.
Exceedingly well put by Reg Rumney. But what are the true colours of Jeremy Cronin and Blade Nzimande? Simply Stalinists in drag! People like Marius Schoon and Bram Fisher will be turning in their graves at the hypocricy of the above reds, and indeed at their cowardice in supporting a Press Tribunal. We want a free press to expose people like the above “cronies” (sic Cronin)!
derek james
I think that Cronin will one day be sitting alone on a chair in his retirement home, an old man looking back on his life, and wonder how in the world he let himself be tricked (assuming that he was left no choice)into supporting such crazy media onslaught!He will be a bit like those people who supported apartheid and are now in denial about it; those people who, today, support Israel’s US human rights abuse and will one day wonder how in the world they failed to stand up and say: “Not in my name!”
Oops, meant to finish “…Israel’s US backed Human Rights abuse…”
Reg, are you really that incredulous and naive? Have you never read a communist manifesto or studied the dogma, strategy and policies of communism? Where in all history have communists been persuaded through reason, logic and the basic rights that free societies enjoy? You are appealing to a brainwashed ideologist that has little capacity to think or conceptualize. These kinds of humans follow slavishly and destroy all before them in pursuit of their goals. I recommend you do some serious research before writing appealing open letters to communists.
Well put Reg.
Logic dictates that if there were pro-ANC rags on the market, that they should command close to 70% of the market share.
Far from suppressing the market, any good capitalist would jump at this opportunity.
We don’t need any legislation to control the media – just a bit of entrepreneurial savvy.
I cannot believe this is the guy that i regarded so highly in the eighties. Now he is just another elite – looking after his power. it is disgusting
I agree with all that has been writen thus far. Tell me Reg do you really expect a disciplined cadre to have any original thought? Is this not the reason that we have a bad political landscape where when any form of leadership is found all nod their heads sagely?
Thank you Reg Rumney. And Max du Preez and Guy Berger. Thank you to the many brave journalists from the liberal English-language press who opposed the old regime. Thank you for their legacy of courage, truth, and independence. I also respected Cronin as a writer, a poet, a thinker. His clinging to an irrelevant SACP that does not have the courage to stand in elections has disappointed me. His unthinking support for the new bills against media and information disappoints me entirely. Take away the old struggle regime of defensive and self-protecting dinosaur politicians. In with the new generation of information-universe young people.
Dear Jeremy
There’s plenty of scope for our own version of Pravda, where you can tell it like it is — even shout it from the roof tops. Problem is, who’s going to buy your version of the TRUTH. But who am I to judge. Why don’t you test it on the market.
Commenters, it misses the point to assume that Cronin is a generic communist – some kind of Stalinist caricature. He isn’t. That’s what makes his support for this tribunal so devastatingly disappointing.
Mr. Cronin, I thought you were one of the good guys. But you’re either for democracy or against it. And you know that to be true. You cannot weaken democracy in order to extend it.
We need to strengthen and resource all levels of media. At the moment only the Capitalist media has the power to sway the masses with their commercials. So if we don’t limit them, we should at least allow every voice access to mass media and promote local and community media to national and international level!
Vaughan Giose
http://www.rainbowcirclefilms.co.za
http://www.ikonsouthafrica.com
So you think Jeremy cares whether you ever respected him or not. The fact is, you and all conservative right wingers are always obssesed to prove your ancestors dierhard assertion that the ANC-Led government is bound to take away freedom from citizens that ironically it fought so hard for. This view then places you and your company into an otherwise reactionary position to always hunt down mistakes from the our democratically elected government. This you do regardless of whether there is a tangible proof against the ANC Policy proposition. You know in as much as we know that our constitution provides for checks and balances to guard against abuse of authority and this applies to both politicians and media houses alike. As if you are reasoning, your hardened attitude continue giving us once more a reason to go ahead with media tribunal. You are not an authority when it come to real opinion making in our country rather a very backward reactionary who is still struggling to come to terms with realities of the day. For your information, the majority of South Africans don’t see South African Media with this innocent or blind eye as you do
Really hit the nail right on the proverbial head! This is just an attempt to keep from sight the out of control spending and corruption of Ministers and ANC / ANCYL tenderpreneural tendancies. I wonder if the Gupta brothers will be allowed to print articles relating to corruption and obscene salaries and bonuses in the private sector? Presumably they will also have recourse to the legislation that will prohibit the mainstream press from printing the same about government / ANC officials. What’s good for the goose….
“free press needed to shatter the state’s a
‘arrogant illussion’ Marx in John Higgin’s article in today’s BusinessDay (6 aug ’10). word of advice to Jeremy et al, bo pw botha tried this path, it did not work. history is awash with dictators who tried to suppress the truth, but as they say, the truth always has a way of finding a way. It is pathetic how you guys are turning out to be, replicas of the apartheid monster, together with the denial that people see that you are naked. These are actions of small people, it is a fight that you can never win.
Well said, but it’s all quite useless. Ultimately it will be pushed through. We can talk, argue, write…it’s gonna happen. If not now, in a few years.
@reg I could not agreewith you more. Government attempts to interfere with press freedom are always dressed up as being taken in the public’s interest but in reality are driven by political self interest with zero regard for the real health of the political body.
Thank you Reg – well articulated. this is one we should battle against with energy and foresight.
Communism has never been known for its press freedom. So Cronin’s cronies are merely doing what their ideology dictates. No surprises there. We already know that the devil loves Prada. In South Africa, the Communism has influence at the highest levels of politics. I don’t criticize or comment, merely state a well publicized fact. Hence, Reg Rumney’s blog post, no matter how eloquently written is somewhat wasted on the ears of those that support censorship. Sadly, for optimists abound, too little too late.
‘Of course, our journalism is not exactly spotless.’
But it’s a hellova lot better than our government service delivery.
Why can’t we have a public service delivery tribunal?
And that tribunal could, I think, quite fairly fine the ministers in their personal capacity instad of via their departments.
We don’t want the Treasury to pay the fines with our tax money, now, do we?
What happened to the topless page 3 girl in “The Voice”. She disappeared. Gone. Censorship is already here. I was devastated. Never buy The Voice again, even if it have pictures of Jesus in someone’s malva puddin and custard.
@Mr. Cronin
Sir, as a fellow socialist I am concerned with this move (the tribunal). One of the difficulties with capitalism is precisely consumption by the ruling class. So far the media has been a watchdog. I agree that a socialist state must have control over the media but it is irresponsible to do so now given the poor record of officialdom here. What counter-balances are proposed?
Great article and argument, Reg. The timing of this censorship discussion is so close to the ANC policy conference where their members will be asking if the Polokwane resolutions have been implemented. And if those tasked to implement the resolutions have failed, then they will face the wrath of their membership. So, their accountability is not to South Africa but to their very small membership. Sad!
Well said.
Has anyone read the ANC discussion document on the media? or cud it be that many readers are consuming what they believe is ‘spotless news’ from print media? Or cud some not care as long as the ‘ANC-bashing’ party wagon is here? After reading the document I was shocked to realise that media freedom and freedom of expression are highlighted throughout the document and other issues that the print media has conviniently left out. My advise to the general reader is empower yourself with your own knowledge before and after reading a newspaper article.
My take is that the media in general is facing far more challenges within itself than its willing to admit. The idea of a media tribunal may not be the greatest of ideas, but trust me this does not translate to the motivation being unreasonable.
@Kwame: RE your post. Fallacious and dangerous. Fallacious because the government (ANC in your post) has failed to state the facts to the voting public – that was left to the press to do, and dangerous because you alienate yourself from friends and foe alike. Did you expect goodwill as in the cases of Selebi, Shaik and Yengeni when the government (ANC) defended these criminals and the bastard press stood up to it? Your anger is misplaced! Viva press freedom and until our consumptionalist government can rid itself of its capitalist excesses the press freedom must stay intact. The powerful bank lobby group in the USA is also foreclosing homes and putting families in the street ‘in the interest of the taxpayers’, as they call it. Therefor similar rhetoric in the discussion document does not impress me. The government and all governments across the globe would be better served to get rid of this rampant capitalism that has scourged the planet and to abolish futures trading in stead. Signed: Jonas, the REAL socialist
Jonas you are so right. If this tribunal actually gets through Parliament and the Constitutional Court (which I seriously doubt) then we can no longer call RSA a democracy. The can never be and will never be a democracy without a free press… The ANC is expending so much energy on this Bill saying they are doing so “for the ordinary man or woman in the street” who cannot afford legal assistance. What a laugh. I don’t know any person either in my personal, social or business life who has been offended by the press. I have asked several people at work – Black, Indian and White and my domestic worker whether they or anyone they know has ever been offended by the press – in each case they answered in the negative. However, most have been badly effected by lack of service delivery and we ARE ALL negatively impacted by tenderpreneurs and corrupt Ministers and officials. WE ARE ALL NEGATIVELY IMPACTED by disgraceful, unnecessary, immoral spending by Ministers and officials who stay in five star hotels, live in luxury on ill gotten gains, buy cars that cost over a million and steal money from government coffers – WE ARE ALL IMPACTED by officials and police who take bribes so let the ANC focus their energies towards sorting out those problems. Let them get over their fat egos which cry foul when THEY have caused a scandal and the press is merely reporting on their bad behaviour. We are not all idiots.
Yep. I believe Selebi’s ‘rate’ for getting rid of those damned rotten scorpions came from a kitty of R15m funded by Mr. Kebble and associates. The ANC has already displayed its omerta metality (as mentioned above). Former and current leaders, their children and grandchildren have become oligarchs. The government already controls taxation, defense and shady cronies run intelligence. Now its the media and the next step is bandit capitalism.
No!
“There are those that abuse the powerful medium of the Press to disturb relations between peoples and to undermine the common weal and the economic welfare of the country. It is against such cases that the Government feels the State must act. It is in these cases that the Government feels that the State must act The Government undeniably has a duty to protect the State, and its citizens, too, against onslaughts of this nature.”
Connie (aka Commie, aka Corny) Mulder 1977
It is nice to know that the Left and the Right have finally come together in an intimate embrace.
Too bad we, in the middle, all get skwished into a sentimental moosh of patriotic fervour for our Peoples Parentland.
How about government priorities – targeting the media – imprisoning journalists – and not real crime? “Sexual violence against children, including the raping of infants, has increased 400 per cent over the past decade (Dempster, 2002) and according to a report by BBC news, a female born in South Africa has a greater chance of being raped in her lifetime than learning how to read (Dempster, 2002).” An ignorant populace – so much easier to brainwash.
The bill will allow all ANC officials to do what they wish and yo declare it a secret. And if we challenge their decisions and actions we will be put into jail without any recourse to justice. It’s facism revisited.