Issued by: African National Congress
Speech by Dumisani Makhaye, ANC KwaZulu Natal Member of Parliament, during the KwaZulu Natal Legislative Budget Debate on 5 May 1997.
Mr Speaker Sir,
I intend to speak on the theme: "The Media and Counter- revolution in South Africa." From the very beginning let me categorically tell this House that I am one of the champions of freedom of the press. Let me also from the very beginning record that there has always been in South Africa two broad categories of the media - the one that championed the interests of the oppressed and exploited such as the Guardian, New Age, The Spark, Inkululeko, African Communist, Umsebenzi, Sechaba, Mayibuye and The World.
This section of the media was brutally suppressed and banned.
On the other hand there were that media which underpinned the system of apartheid colonialism and fascism in this country. This section of the media has never forgiven the black people and the democratic forces for having defeated apartheid colonialism. There absolutely no difference in substance between the English and Afrikaans press. Their common denominator was that Africans would never be equal to the white colonial masters. They were not the victims of apartheid. They were benefactors.
The concept of freedom of the press has never been abstract. From its very inception it specifically referred to that media that championed the interests of the oppressed, progressive, the new, that which was still struggling to be born. In short, the media that was struggling for greater freedoms. It never referred to oppressive and privileged groupings. During the revolutionary transition from feudalism to capitalism it championed the interests of the new, then progressive capitalism. Similarly, in present South Africa it should mean that media that fights for the interests of the new democracy, nation-building and non-racialism and not that which still wants to reverse the clock of history. It should mean that media which wants to comprehensively address the all-round historical injustice against the economic minority - the black people in general and the Africans in particular.
Those who were ready to pay the supreme sacrifice in order to defeat the height of human degradation in this country, the ANC-led Tripartite Alliance, has always described the South African situation as colonialism of the special type where the coloniser and the colonised shared the common territory. But its essence remains colonialism.
In his fairwell speech, the last Indian Consular in Durban noted the hostile attitude of the South African media to the new South Africa. Indeed, the white establishment media behave exactly as the French media and the Portuguese media behaved towards Algeria and former African Portuguese colonies immediately after their independence. This section of the media is not only racist but is also colonial. The concept of freedom of the press is being abused to perpetuate the interests and values of the internal colonial power.
Indeed, the establishment print media did not support racism passively. It itself was a racist institution and it had to protect its own internal racism. There was no apartheid law that forced the media to refer to freedom fighters as terrorists nor was there a law forcing media bosses not to trust stories emanating from black journalists. It is not the apartheid state that made African journalists to drink tea out of enamel cups while white journalists drank from decent cups.
It is more than seven years ago that the apartheid regime was forced to agree that racism was no longer practicable. But in those years we have not seen any change in the news rooms and in the editorial boards. This phenomenon is much more pronounced in the white establishment print media of KwaZulu Natal. Out of roughly 200 journalists, sub-editors and editors of the Natal Newspapers there are about only 10 African journalists, and all of them are mere reporters. If you enter a news room in South Africa, you may be forgiven if one thought it was a news room in France or Germany. Of course, the media situation is compounded by the sinister activities of the former apartheid covert forces littered in the media. The media is lagging behind even the white political parties.
Of course, there are visible changes, albeit very slow, in media organisations such as Sowetan, City Press, The Star, Sunday Times, Cape Times etc. What about KwaZulu Natal?
In the KZN 2 Nite there are no Africans in the three most important positions - the regional editor, news editor and political editor. It is not surprising that the KZN 2 Nite Friday Programme dealing with the media has never featured an African journalist. Not long ago the news editor of Radio Zulu was an Afrikaner editor who could not utter a word in Zulu. KwaZulu Natal present Regional News Editor is a person who cannot utter a word in Zulu even though Radio Zulu is the biggest and the most profitable radio station in South Africa.
In a clever way, the colonial forces within the SABC after 1994 undertook a programme where there will be some black faces in the senior management and in the lower echelons of the management and leaving the middle management which decides the final product in white colonial hands.
It is therefore no coincident that for example on Saturday a rally at Impendle which was supposed to be addressed by the President of the ruling party and his speech was actually read by the ANC National Chairperson and Minister of Economic Affairs and Tourism and addressed by Provincial Minister of Health and Deputy Minister of Defence was never covered by the SATV. Yet the rally of S'fiso Derrick Nene and Holomisa was extensively covered.
With these circumstances in the media industry it is therefore not surprising the way the media interpretates events in South Africa. It would be naive to expect such a media to tell the good story of the non-racial and anti-colonial forces. Take the question of the peace process in KwaZulu Natal. The ANC engaged in talks with the National Party in peace talks and the cut-off dates for amnesty. The media encouraged those talks.
There was pressure from the extreme right-wing white parties on the cut-off date for amnesty. When President Mandela stood fast on the cut-off date, the media accused him of being intransigent. When May 10 1994 was then agreed upon, this was hailed by the colonial media. All these cut-off dates benefited the apartheid security forces in the main. When there are similar talks with the IFP, both the ANC and the IFP are accused of engendering the culture of impunity. In other words, when the ANC talks to white colonial parties, the colonial media hails those talks. When the ANC speaks to the party with the same constituency, it is heresy. But we were never accused of engendering the culture of impunity when the oppressed people said there were not going to take punitive measures against those sections of the white community who for decades voted for racism and apartheid.
Look also at how the colonial media handled the case of Terre Blanche when he was found guilty in the court of law recently. Suppose Jacob Zuma and Dr Ben Ngubane had behaved exactly the same, the colonial media would have called for their immediate arrests.
Take also the case of the invasion of Bophuthatswana by the AWB and the General Viljoen forces. Dozens of Africans were killed and maimed simply for being Africans. That is of no interest to the colonial media. Their interests are in the three Boers who were killed in the process of their invasion.
Fortunately, the establishment print media has no great influence on the minds of our African people. In a survey just before the Local Government elections, it is indicated that only 7% of Africans got news about those elections from the print media. If Africans had confidence in the printed word in South Africa, the ANC, IFP and PAC would not have together got about 74% of the votes in the 1994 democratic elections.
We achieved that percentage inspite of and not because of the colonial media. The question is whether it is strategically correct to encourage our people to believe in the printed word of the colonial press.
We have often under-estimated the combined strength of the ANC, IFP and PAC. Unfortunately, we still over-emphasise the differences among ourselves even though we represent basically the same constituency. When the ANC is under the constant attack from the colonial media, the IFP rejoices.
Similarly, the ANC still rejoices when the IFP is under media attack even if it is clearly unjustified.
Recently the ANC and IFP demonstrated how much they can achieve if they speak with one voice on matters that are of common interests to both of them. When the manager of the Spar Store at Umbilo threw young African kids into a freezer for allegedly breaking a trolley, both the ANC and IFP stood up and called for justice to be done. The Manager and two others have been fired.
It is being naive to expect the colonial media to speak good about governments run by the anti-colonial forces at whatever level. Indeed, one may advise our governments that the day they are praised by the colonial media, they must stop whatever they are doing and check what a silly mistake they are committing.
Of course, the question of the democratisation of the colonial media is more than a question of increasing the number of African journalists at all levels of the media industry. Indeed, we must be careful that they are not co- opted and corrupted.
As long as the property relations remains skewed in favour of the colonial forces, there will be no democratic transformation of the media. Media organisations are run through adverts and not just through sales. The advertisers can make or break a media organisation. Remember the Rand Daily Mail and The New African! But in order to advertise you must have something to advertise - property. And, property in South Africa remains firmly in white hands or in the hands of the former colonial oppressor. They cannot be expected to influence the media in favour of the anti-colonial forces.
Therefore the struggle for the democratic transformation of the media is directly linked with the struggle for the redistribution of the wealth. Racism and apartheid as forms of legal consciousness were not simply creations of evil men. They were embedded in the economic base whose property relations favoured the colonial white forces.
Racism and apartheid were never standing above and divorced from the conflict between the colonised oppressed black majority and the colonising white minority. Indeed, the media is still owned by the latter. Apartheid and racism have always performed an economic function in favour of colonial powers.
If the captains of industry have indeed broken away from their apartheid colonial past, they will be expected to begin to influence the white establishment colonial media into real South African media. The captains of industry have the power of capital and therefore advertisements. They must use that power to contribute to a new South Africanism.
Unfortunately, the last apartheid regime entered into a plethora of contracts and agreements in terms of government advertisements in the very colonial media. In other words the taxpayer still contributes heavily in terms of government advertisements to the colonial press. It is time to revisit those agreements.
We do not want media which will be the mouthpiece of the government. Yet we also do not want media that champions the exclusive interests of the colonial powers. But we do want media that will be reflective of the diversed views of our people in their magnificent variety.
Let us create the real South African media! That needs gutts, will and vision. It needs a clear programme of media transformation.