Issue 24, Vol 7: 14 October 2010 *In this issue:*
- Building grassroots media to Empower the Voices of the People<http://www.ycl.org.za/main.php?include=pubs/bot/2010/issue24.html#one> - The DA's push for LRA Amendment must be opposed<http://www.ycl.org.za/main.php?include=pubs/bot/2010/issue24.html#two> [image: Political Notes]Building grassroots media to Empower the Voices of the People Of the many issues raised in the discussion about the proposed Media Appeals Tribunal (MAT), which will now be discussed in parliament, media houses chose to focus only on how this will only be a license for government to arbitrarily arrest journalists and editors and close newspaper houses as was the case in Zimbabwe and other African countries. They have denounced this process as an apartheid-style approach by the ANC to control what gets transmitted to the public, especially news that is critical of or exposes corruption in government. This, they claim, is because newsrooms have become the beacon of hope to an uninformed public in its fight against corruption and its blinded loyalty in re-electing the ANC into government. And as a sign that the ANC is loosing it, they seek to tighten the grip on the right to freedom of expression in order to determine news and opinions of newspapers. In a nutshell, the Nats are back in the form of the ANC, and this time, they are as resolute as North Korea or China. Because of the monopoly the powerful media houses possess in the transmission of information, and the trust bestowed on them by the unsuspecting public, they planted the seed in society of a gory ANC hell-bent on reversing the very same rights they helped to restore in the fight against apartheid. When reading some of the columns prepared against the ANC and the Alliance, and the depiction of the SACP General Secretary in some of the pages, you could have been mistaken to think you are right in the 80’s and Pretoria is not yet Tshwane. But my intention today is not to defend the media onslaught on the MAP, this has been done sufficiently. I want to argue that there should be more in the debate for media transformation than a mere scare-crow on shutting them down. We need newspapers, radios, the internet and television as a source for educating, informing and entertaining our people. The working class and poor youth need to receive fair and balanced news on their country and the world, and also have their voices and perspectives heard about where this country should go without any distortions. The voices of young people should at all times be paramount, and the media, both public and private, holds the responsibility to ensure that they transmit this voice without the illusion of seeking to replace it. In many instances, media houses claim to ‘speak for the people’ instead of allowing the people to speak for themselves. In this way, they determine the extent of freedom of thinking and engagement, what they refer to as public opinion. This is done in many and easy ways, and in some instances, it is not about what is written. Sometimes it’s more about what is not written which brings the entire information world in to total chaos. If people make decisions on the basis of limited information, we have denied them the right to freedom in making such decisions, and with the power and influence of the media, they have the responsibility and should be made to account for such. The fundamental right to information by the public in order for them to determine what is right and what is wrong, and for them to be empowered to make important choices in the course of democracy should never be underestimated. The transmission of this information has to reach the public without fear, favour or bias. This right goes parallel to the right of the public to be heard without any distortions. The media claims that their responsibility is to conform to what is newsworthy, and ensure that they hand the information to the people for them to decide; this is never the case. In many instances, newsrooms determine public perceptions and opinions through how they craft news. They sometimes omit to report certain news under the guise of ‘not newsworthy’; when in actual fact their filtering of news is intended to achieve a certain economic, political or socio-economic objective. The media claims to give the people freedom of choice, but this happens within limited choices whose objectives sometimes are the same. In this way, newspapers are structured to achieve a certain ideological or political objective. This is even worse when there are no alternative, fully financed media institutions whose survival is not dependent on profits but on their ability to be objective and transmit news without fear or favour. Then there is the issue of transformation and ownership. Many of us believe that it is the editors of newspapers who own newspapers. They do not. It is shareholders of companies such as Naspers, Primedia, Avusa and Caxton who own the newspaper brands from production to circulation. The responsibility of editors is to ensure that papers sustains or increases its circulation, and thus increase profitability. Many editors have fallen from grace because they reported what they believed is news worth people knowing, but if the shareholders are not happy, they got fired. Some may argue that newspapers needs to make profits in order to survive, but in the final analysis, the large chunk of the profits made by these newspaper do not necessarily go back into the production process but into the pockets of shareholders. An independent media should not only be the one that pleases a few rich men and women by placing news that purportedly boosts circulation and therefore profits. In fact, many journalists, drivers, cleaners and general workers of newspapers earn a pittance compared to what the shareholders earn. In some instances, because profits do not go into the production cycle of newspapers, they end up relying on the internet and SAPA to source news stories and thus affecting the quality of news. (A case in point was the story that Julius Malema will not stand in 2011 as the president of the ANC Youth League, a news story that was first transmitted by Beeld, and then SAPA and thereafter almost every media house in the country without confirming its veracity. The ANC YL later denied Comrade Malema having said this) An independent media should be the one that takes a developmental posture towards news, become educational and informative, and also entertain. The struggle against the apartheid media and its financed ‘independent’ institutions was not only for a few who can read or write, or who can buy shares in media houses, to shape the voice of the people. It was intended at ensuring that, unfiltered and undistorted stories, the cries of our people for political, economic and social justice is attained. It was to ensure that the people own media institutions and through this, can control the messages and demands that goes into the public. As we agonise and engage about whether we need a MAT, we should also be debating about the responsibility of government to finance and provide capacity for grassroot media institutions such as community newspapers, radio and television stations. These should not be made to go cap in hand to advertisers for funding, as this will mean that their voices will be manipulated in order to be music to the ruling class. In this way, government will also be creating a platform in which it can engage with people directly without mitigation by the private media houses. The Media Development and Diversity Institute should be given a fresher mandate and resources to empower ordinary people to run media institutions. The Media Appeals Tribunal (MAT) will be the door-MAT in which we dust off unaccountable, unwanted and malicious voices within the media which gives this profession the bad name. That’s the Bottomline...cos the YCLSA said so! *Buti Manamela YCLSA National Secretary* The DA's push for LRA Amendment must be opposed The recent opportunistic amendment proposal by the DA of the Labour Relations Act so as to include liability of unions in the event of damage to property, in the cause of strikes or marches should be vehemently opposed. The DA is being provocative in this move and in the final analysis, this is meant to blunt if not to technically destroy the main weapon for trade unions – labour unrest. The labour relations Act and other pieces of labour legislations, in their current form, are a product of a thorough-going and an extensive process between government and labour particularly COSATU after 1994. They represent the finer balance for both employers and workers and have shaped the workplaces with workers rights, their unions and employers rights and their employers' representative organizations. And these laws remain as relevant as they were in 1996. In pursuit of the labour relations Act amendment, the DA cites the Hlophe judgement in 2006 after the SATAWU strike and a reported damage to shops in Cape Town as a basis for this advance. I must say that I am equally disturbed by some within the movement, for opportunistic reasons also, are unofficially sharing DA perspective particularly after the biggest public sector strike. If there is legal precedent in the form of Hlophe judgement, it therefore means that there is an established legal recourse in event where damage to property is associated to the union. It effectively means Courts have a locus standi in providing justice in such circumstances. Therefore why one would want to further amend a piece of legislation to insert a liability aspect when the Court can rule against a particular union allege to be responsible for such damage to property so that it is liable. The danger from this proposed amendment is that it will limit the scope of legal liability to a union and therefore close the door to individual liability on the basis of being a culprit to property damage. This is important because no union has ever sanctioned to its members the fact that they can damage property or cause violence. It is a fact that in the cause of marches and strikes some agent provocateurs who are not associated with the union do participate in actions as an ostensible part of support to the cause of workers. And it is impossible for marshals to know everybody in the membership. So these community members as they participate in red attire, in the process they do certain things that are stranger to the culture of a given union including such unbecoming acts. Do you continue to hold the union liable? This is not to say that union members are innocent in some cases but each case must checked against its objective specifics (whether collective union liability or individuals liability) to which the Court, if someone resorts to, can navigate in pursuit for justice. If that amendment can go through, during strikes, the DA will always sponsor agent provocateurs to participate in order to damage property in the name of unions so that they become liable. The intention would be to discourage ultimately strikes and unions would be afraid to resolve on strikes because the inevitability of property damages. Alas! The DA and its surrogates including established capital would have achieved what they want: a docile working class with no organizational muscle to fight! This call is by no means connected to the call for flexible labour laws in order to strengthen the hand of the employers in the workplace. Opposition parties must also learn that they cannot impose their perspectives to the ruling party so that there is policy change according to their own image as though they are in power. Let them win power and therefore tailor-make policies according to what they represent. We must call for ANC MP's to just kill this intention as early as now in the Portfolio committee. *Khaye Nkwanyana Deputy National Secretary of the Young Communist League* -- Gugu Ndima +27 76 783 1516 -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] .
