Self-regulation is the way to go

RAMPHOLO MOLEFE
Correspondent | Friday October 22, 2010 00:00

Mbeki killed two birds with one stone. He first pointed out, in response to whether there was dialogue among the Southern African Development Community (SADC) leaders, about the protection and cultivation of public media and the abolition of the state form of press, that:

*There was no state media in south Africa; and* Ownership and management of the press in that country did not sufficiently reflect the relative sizes of the racial groupings that were the cornerstone of apartheid policy prior to 1994.

Mogae, clearly aware of the implications of Mbeki's response, pointed to the existence of some eight privately owned newspapers and radio stations, tactfully avoiding discussion of the dominant position of the state press, in terms of both financial and human resource.

Ironically, it was apparent that even the demonised system of apartheid, even as it gave greater advantage to the 'white constituency', had nevertheless recognised the centrality of institutional separation of state and press in the process of democratic governance, however limited.

Fifteen years down the line, there has been a deliberate and purposeful degeneration of the democratic ideals that placed reform of the structure of the media and its content in southern Africa at the head of the regional agenda.

Needless to say this retrogression in the development of the press walks side by side with claims of the pursuit of a 'knowledge based society' that also embraces the advent of 'information technology' as an instrument for the building of 'an educated and informed nation', as Botswana's Vision 2016 would have it.

Yet it appears to be the very Botswana, perhaps the most venerated of the southern African countries for its pursuit of the democratic ideal, that is by all objective standards, in the lead of the regional movement of governments against the liberalisation of press law, self-regulation and cultivation of the ground towards a free and independent press commensurate with 21st Century standards of democratic governance.

In the absence of a detailed analysis of the evolution of the media in the region, it will suffice to note:

* The general reluctance of the post independence regimes to part with the media structures they inherited from the colonial administrations, in many if not most instances, adopting the constitutions of those organisations in their use for propaganda purposes to blind the general populace to corruption and abuse of power in the highest echelons of government and the private sector;

*Demonisation of the private press which, though friendly to government at the management and business level, often houses mischievous journalists who struggle against all odds to uphold the original ethos of journalism and its best ideals;

*Ambivalence towards the forms of ownership and practice that are most friendly to democracy and popular participation in the management and political and economic direction of the press; that is, the public and community based media; and

* corruption of the basic tenets of journalism by co-opting the best people into the mode of operation of the state media, corrupting ethical and professional standards by recruiting casual labourers, policemen, failed careerists, politicians and lunatics into the profession and undermining trade unionism in the journalism profession.

The SADC Nordic Journalism Centre in Maputo, Mozambique, leaving a website based in South Africa to announce three or four courses for the year, most of them dealing with media management and IT.

The journalism schools in the region have become laboratories where adventurous Western media specialists conduct experiments to determine the response of small African brains to impulses around the themes of 'globalisation' and the Internet;  none of them related to mastery of language and  craftsmanship; none of them related to the orientation of the journalist towards activism at the press club and the trade union of journalists where there shall be discussion of current events, ethics, and strategies for the strengthening of public and community based media, also pursuing abolition of the state media and tolerance for the privately owned press.Is it not the trade union of journalists, which must establish self-regulation and set standards for membership of the profession, also agreeing to principles of professional conduct and ethics?

Sila Press Agency, led by senior Zambian journalist Alfred Mulenga, reports that the International Press Institute (IPI) based in Vienna, has warned the government of Zambia against imposing regulations on the media, also disrespecting the proposal for a press council suggested by the journalists' community.

'It is a recipe for disaster,' reports Sila, quoting spokesperson of IPI.  It had been reported earlier that the Minister of Information Ronald Shikapwashya had rejected proposals of the journalists for 'self-regulation' on the grounds that they were something of a duplicate of those in force in South Africa.

Is that not in fact what is desirable; the standardisation of systems of self-regulation that have so far eluded the SADC region, which seems to be driven by the instinct of self-preservation of the leaders rather than building genuine 'people' driven democracy?

It appears that the intervention of IPI will assist the government and the journalists to find 'a better understanding' which will allow the press council envisaged by the journalists one year of operation before the government makes any further intervention. 

South Africa, apparently failing at the restructuring of the press to reflect what Thabo Mbeki referred to as 'the demographics of the population', appears to have opted for preoccupation with taming the print media, for which there is a paucity of (government) regulation.

In last week's programme of 'Interface', Mathatha Tsedu and Professor Anton Habor , former co-editor of the Weekly Mail and Guardian, commented that the proposed law, which was intended to establish the 'media tribunal', was not specific in what it defined as 'state secrets'.

They argued, against rebuttals from the legal advisor in the president's office, that the law was all embracing in its definition of what it meant by 'state secrets'.

The legal advisor responded that he did not believe that the proposed law was unconstitutional and that it would not cause any limitation to press freedom. This, apparently, he also advised parliament.

Former Minister of Information and veteran freedom fighter, Ron Kasrils, who had also occupied the position of Minister of Intelligence Services, found the proposed law offensive saying (paraphrase): 'This law goes against everything that we had proposed in our law, that regulation should be strictly limited to those areas in which state security should not be compromised.  But this new law is so general that it also engulfs areas over which government need not interfere'.

This is the former minister of intelligence who, having done 'security work' during and after the precarious conditions of the liberation struggle, found no reason for the state to be as insecure as it appears to be about the contribution of the press to South Africa's fledgling democracy.

After rigorous protest from the journalists and all quarters of civil society, vice president Khalema Mohlanthe, met with the journalists last week and decided that the government would rely on the opinion of the press ombudsman before it considers any pursuant action.

The final decision on the establishment of the media tribunal, also backed by communist leader Gwide Mantashe following the visit of Julius Malema to the youth wing of the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP), like that of the Zambians, will be held in abeyance.

Zimbabwe was chosen as the first chairperson of the Southern African journalists Association after Botswana proposed the establishment of the organisation in Recife, Brazil, in 1988.  The sentiment would have been that such a concession would help to highlight resistance to the protection of information law that Robert Mugabe's government proposed.

That in addition to ownership of the press institutions that took refuge under the guise of a public media regime inherited from the racist Ian Smith Regime.

Further resistance culminated in the demand by the then opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) led by Morgan Tsvangerai, seeking recognition of a free and independent press and rescinding of  ZANU's proposed media legislation, in addition to putting a stop to the arbitrary arrest of Zimbabwean journalists and banning of the foreign press.

Presumably, trade union and popular resistance to the proposed law has stalled it, perhaps contribution to the recent announcement by South Africa and Botswana that they recommend the lifting of sanctions against Zimbabwe because they can only impede the progress that has been made towards democratic governance.

In Botswana, the  media community awaits with bated breath, the decision of the courts on the suit that seeks condemnation of the recently instituted Media Practitioners Act, which amongst others, legitimises interference of the minister of communications in the appointment of a press council and its judicial organs, also seeking registration of journalists.

The suit  will raise constitutional questions about the legal guarantees of press freedom,  even as that must be proved against the constitutional provisions that permit the President, through his ministers, to do any such thing as such be considered necessary for the facilitation of the work of government.

That follows a shoddy process of negotiating the position of the press against a non-existent offer from government seeking the enactment of the media practitioners' law.

Embarrassingly, the press folk who got themselves tapped in the negotiations now issue disclaimers that suggest that then minister of communications, Pelonomi Venson, misled herself in the crafting of the media practitioners' law, which, they claim, did not take into account their submissions.  Highly unlikely!

The more plausible position is that both government and the 'media' people it had co-opted negotiated themselves into a position where each went away in the belief that the minister's product would reflect their secret negotiations the basis of which were the preserve of the partners in crime.

That is water under the bridge.  The observation to be made is that no useful media law will hold if it bypasses the interest of the mass of journalists who must choose to subject themselves to the agreed instruments of self-regulation. Earlier proposals for self-regulation suggested that:

*The journalists organisation  - the journalists association, then BOJA would give way to the Journalists and Allied Media Workers Union - will elect the secretary for education , discipline, ethics and professional conduct .  This presumes that education in matter of ethics and professional conduct must precede the overwhelming temptation to punish transgressions.

*This executive officer will see to the appointment of an officer of the Law Society of Botswana or the office of the Ombudsman to head an autonomous committee of ethics, professional conduct and discipline which would listen to complaints from within and outside the press community relating to any aspect of profession work in the media.  The committee would include eminent personalities in journalism in the majority and community leaders excluding politicians or powerful people who might buy the decisions of the committee to favour their interest.(Sitting editors or other managers who might on occasion be required to represent the interests of the proprietor may sit on the committee without a vote).

*Journalist shall man a person who gathers and reports news as his or her primary means of livelihood.  (A discussion on that definition is reflected in documents of the constitutional meeting held at the Gaborone Hotel on March 2, 2002.)  In the interests of the principle of 'One union, one industry, allied workers shall include, accountants, editors, distribution, printers, newspaper boys and girls, teachers, public relations people, whose voting rights and subscriptions shall be determined by the general conference)

*The judgements of the disciplinary committee shall represent the legal opinion of the executive of the union for submission to the courts established under the laws of the land.  The highest penalty that the committee may impose is that of withdrawal of membership or an agreed fine.  The committee is not a court of law but an arbitration body concerned only with the settlements of disputes of a professional nature. The erroneous argument in favour of imposition of external regulations claims that journalists will not take firm action against their own; that therefore government must, in the public interest, adopt that position. Common sense asks then why the law society, medical practitioners, accountants and bankers operate according to their own regulations, which are sensitive to the ethics and required discipline of their professions.

If the argument should be taken a step further, should it not be asked why the politicians enjoy the privilege of speaking as they like at the freedom squares, parliament and councils without an oversight body that passes judgement on whether their deliberations respect professional ethics and conduct. 

The reality is that it takes five years for the electorate to cast the vote that may decide that one or the other politician has failed at ethical or professional conduct.  (The courts will intervene only where the politicians are accused of criminal activity in the same way as any other citizen, with the obvious exception of the president of the country). 

Government and successive government authorities  responsible for information and subsequent ministers of communications, have rebuked the above suggestions initially made by the Botswana Journalists Association.BOJA also proposed an annual or biennial media conference, which, had the suggestion been listened to, have discussed public broadcasting, community based media, self-regulation, the media and national security, also establishing a collective bargaining (as opposed to secret negotiations with handpicked individuals in the press).

In any case, cursory research will show that even in the most developed democracies, the institutions that the Botswana government has imposed upon the media in the name of self- regulation, have not worked as efficiently as they would have been expected.

Usually, it is the very rich who manipulate these institutions in their own favour, using the power of their social standing and financial resources to pursue complaints for years, not seeking a professional judgement, but rather, economic emasculation of the media institutions.

Whatever the case, the reality is that no measure of regulation will serve a useful purpose unless it is developed, owned and publicised by the professionals, in this case the journalists whose judgement is not tainted by their obligations to the proprietors (editors and other mangers)  and the politicians as at the state press.

The formal establishment of the Interim executive of the Journalists and allied Media Workers Union was delayed by the World Cup and a search for the papers that document the struggle for the establishment of the union. Botswana is lagging behind regional partners in the formalisation of the establishment of the union.

November should not pass without the re-establishment of the union with the government registrar and the journalists' community.

*Relevant literature including the constitution of the union, papers on the history of the BOJA and the union, position papers on ethics of the International federation of Journalists are available in all newspaper houses and radio and television stations.