Business Day *A note on General Nyanda**Peter Bruce, Editor, Business Day [front page], Johannesburg, 2 August 2010*
COMMUNICATIONS Minister Gen (Retd.) Siphiwe Nyanda wrote a substantial article yesterday in the Sunday Times, criticising a report about him in what he called "a Johannesburg-based newspaper" which had published "false, and malicious" allegations about him. It's clear he's referring to the Business Day front page lead of July 15, headlined 'Nyanda in fresh storm over state tenders'. In it we said Gen Nyanda was about to suspend his director- general, Mamodupi Mohlala and that he had instructed that all tenders for the communications department be put on hold until he had reviewed them. Here we were secure in our reporting.
Gen Nyanda did not use our name yesterday because, I presume, it suited him not to. It enabled him to use the Sunday Times to write a wider criticism of the media, in defence of ANC plans to create a tribunal to "deal" with errant reporting. So it was especially useful that our report contained this paragraph: "A source close to the pair said Ms Mohlala had refused to approve tenders because they were awarded to companies linked to people close to Gen Nyanda and a private company, General Nyanda Security."
That was poor reporting and editing. There was no way we could substantiate such a charge at the time of writing. It is intolerable to allow anonymous attacks on the reputations of named people without evidence and every editor and every reporter on Business Day knows that. Had Gen Nyanda ever called me to complain I like to think I would have immediately appreciated the severity of what we had done to him and I would have printed a front page apology to him the next day. I do make that apology to him now, sincerely and without reservation. The Editor
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