SA news media: under pressure AND under magnifying lens

"Scathing" is how the Government described Media Monitoring Africa's assessment that reporting on the Protection of State Information Bill has been poor and one-sided. Unsurprisingly, that was taken as an affirmation that media in this country operate with an anti-government bias. Daily Maverick takes a more in-depth look at the issue

By Osiame Molefe

16 Apr 2012

None of the media organisations present at the hearings into the Protection of State Information Bill (POSIB) reported that Media Monitoring Africa said coverage of the bill had been one-sided and poor.

In addition, a statement released days later by the government highlighting this aspect of MMA's presentation received virtually no pick-up in the main stream press. This means that if the private company the ANC hired to monitor media reports and individual journalists were meticulous at its job, it could have two new entries to file in the dossier to back the party's allegations of bias on the part of the media. These would be in addition to the ANC's original allegation, seemingly now affirmed, that the reporting on the bill has not been without bias.

According to a statement by Ministry of State Security spokesman Brian Dube, media law practitioner Justine Limpitlaw said in her presentation on behalf of the MMA: "The media did this country a disservice with its biased and poor reporting. A number of good aspects of this bill, and there are many, have not been reported on.

...Speaking to Daily Maverick, Limpitlaw drew a distinction between poor reporting on one hand and one-sided reporting on the other because, while they are closely inter-related, they are different.

Read the full story on www.DailyMaverick.co.za.

See also:

Media Monitoring Africa: Protection of State Information Bill Oral Submission, 28 March 2012
Parliamentary Monitoring Group: Protection of State Information Bill: public hearing day 2
GCIS statement: Media failed the country with Info Bill reporting

About the author

Osiame Molefe is a Cape Town-based writer who [[http://dailymaverick.co.za/opinionistas/osiame-molefe contributes]] to the [[www.dailymaverick.co.za Daily Maverick]] and [[www.zanews.co.za ZANews]]. Follow him on Twitter at [[@TOMolefe]].