Media Monday - hot topics and topics that make us hopping mad! 24 October 2011

Posted: 24 October 2011 | News - Newsletter | Categories: Children, Democracy and Governance, Media Freedom and Performance

On the menu this Media Monday:

·         Media goes all out, splashing graphic images of Gaddafi

·         Proof that media really does NOT report on own struggles?

·         Presidential house upgrades: did media get it right?

Gaddafi’s death, in pictures 

The world was late last week brought to an almost standstill following reports of the death of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. Colonel Gaddafi had gone into hiding following his military forces being pushed back by rebel forces, and was reportedly killed in his hometown of Sirte after being captured by Libyan fighters.

He was shot and captured by the said fighters, but later died because of bullet wounds in his stomach where he was shot. This was confirmed by the doctor who performed an autopsy on Gaddafi’s body, reportedly settling conflicting accounts on how he died. As the Libyan story had already been dominating media headlines for sometime prior to Gaddafi’s capture and death, media all over the world reported widely on the story of his death. It is the media coverage that we would like to put under the spotlight here.

Images of Gaddafi were put on newspaper front pages and videos flighted on prime time news bulletins. It must be indicated that the images were of very graphic nature, and some South African media also did not exercise “due care and responsibility” it would seem, and went ahead with such images.

Internationally, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) defended its broadcasting of footage of Gaddafi in his dying moments. The Corporation said the images were editorially justified to convey the scale of the dramatic and gruesome events. Bringing it closer to home, was the use of such graphic images by some South African media justified? Was it really necessary to publish the footage? Was it in the public interest? Was it ethical especially given that when Osama Bin Laden was killed there was a deliberate attempt not to release the footage? If the images warranted being used, were they published in the right pages of newspapers? Were warnings communicated about the graphic nature of the images beforehand? What do you think?

We put this issue on our Facebook and Twitter pages and received interesting feedback. Below is a few of the responses we got on our Facebook post (check full discussion here):

Mzukisi Ka-Gwata wrote on Facebook: Irrelevant to me, I have been seeing video clips of Gaddafi shortly after his execution. Thanks to Aljazeera we now know that people get killed badly in wars. This thing of sanitizing news is nonsense really. Isn't the media a mirror of what happens? If the world we live in is crazy and bloody, i don't think it is the role of the media to sanitize it on our behalf.

Aneshree Naidoo wrote: I think its as sensationalist as you using it here? A warning at least? The photo is not in the public interest at all.

Lesley Odendal wrote: i think its gross and i dont think it proves anything. noone should celebrate when a person dies. we have to ask ourselves why we allowed him to be around for so long

Thandi Smith: I think the media assumes that we are 'desensitized' to these kinds of images and they assume that this is the kind of thing people WANT to see, most people ive spoken to disagree with the pictures and say the media should not be spreading them across front pages without warning....yet again, media gets it wrong....

Christina Stucky said: i think several media are publishing these pics also because of what happened after osama bin laden's killing: remember there was widespread criticism that there was no "photographic evidence" of his death and for some time disbelief that he was in fact dead.

This view was shared by IvoVegterwho tweeted:

@MediaMattersZA @nickymccainSimple. Without those pictures people will say it's all US lies. Like they did with Bin Laden and Uday & Qusay.

Other “Tweeple” also voiced their thoughts on the publishing of such images by media.

jbjreid(Julie Reid) tweeted:@MediaMattersZAmay breach pt 10 of new press code but is in public interest so culd probably argue both ways. I wouldn't have done it tho

FaithJDaniels(Faith J Daniels) said: @MediaMattersZAits appalling and unnecessary

angelaquintal(Angela Quintal) said: @MediaMattersZALess is more. I wouldn't have published as main pic. Liked M&G's front pg pic - said it all without being graphic about it

OCMSACBC(Chris Townsend)posted: @MediaMattersZA#media#mediamatterszasent a complaint to BCCSA. He might have been an evil person, but we r all diminished by that image. if we removed the name of the person & the ideas associated with the person, would we still have shown that? Tatane, Gaddafi, ET. The pics are not add value. not information. Just blood lust? my concern is what's next?

These are just a few Tweet responses we received; see our Twitter mentions for more responses.

Also feel free to use both our Facebook and Twitter platforms to give us your opinion on the matter. We would really appreciate your feedback and pick your brains on this one.

Zuma houses to get a revamp, or not… 

The media reported on October 20th about close to R400m that would be used to revamp President Jacob Zuma’s presidential houses and offices. Exactly what each portion of the money would be spent was detailed by Public Works Minister Gwen Mahlangu-Nkabinde in a written response for a parliamentary question asked by the Democratic Alliance (DA) parliamentary leader Athol Trollip.

But in a surprising turn of events later that day, the Minister called the reports “utter nonsense” and put it on record that no refurbishment on Zuma’s residence to the amount of R170m in taxpayers’ money will take place. This was in response to reports of this money planned to be spent on Zuma’s Pretoria residence.

Mahlangu-Nkabinde’s department actually said that Parliament had received wrong information on the renovations, and that the minister had cancelled plans of such renovations in March this year. Realizing that the proposed cost of the refurbishments was too high, the minister ordered that they should not go ahead and issued a statement on March 22 to that effect.

As to how the wrong information was sent to Parliament on the matter, is anyone’s guess at the moment. Reports yesterday were that a public works department official who drafted the Parliamentary response on the cost of the renovations was taking the fall for the mishap, but the department declined to comment on the matter.

Serious and valid questions still remain unanswered though. Athol Trollip asked "Why was detailed information about the planned renovations sent to the DA, if the renovations had been scrapped?" and "Why did the Minister sign off on these replies if they were incorrect?" We would also like to know, really! Especially when it seemed that the ruling party also either knew about the planned refurbishments, or was also not aware they were put on hold.

The ruling African National Congress (ANC) spokesperson, Jackson Mthembu, criticized the reaction to the matter. Mthembu accused the media, along with opposition parties, of criminalising the issue and of always finding the wrong in everything government does.

It would seem that the fact that the proposal to revamp the houses was shelved obviously went over the head of someone in the public works department ending up in wrong information being sent to Parliament as a response. And probably also that whoever sent the response was not aware the revamp was put on hold by the minister. Also clear is that even the ANC may not have been aware that Mahlangu-Nkabinde stopped the proposed revamps, judging by Mthembu’s comments who pointed a finger at the media and the opposition instead of indicating the truth of the matter, which is that the proposed or planned revamps stopped by Minister Mahlangu-Nkabinde.

The department said it found it "very absurd and ridiculous that some journalist published a grossly and factually inaccurate report". Sounds like some sort of shifting the blame to the media, but the questions still stands: how did the media run with the story and fail to spot the inaccuracy thereof? Did the media get it wrong? Were facts not checked and verified before publishing? What do you think?

Is media neglecting its own struggles: What do you think? 

Wednesday October 19 marked 34th year commemoration of “Black Wednesday” and the South African National Editors’ Forum (Sanef) had an event planned to commemorate this day. The day marked 34 years since the National Party government banned black consciousness organisations, newspapers and jailed journalists.

The event was held simultaneously as Sanef’s 15th year anniversary celebrations, and the day also marked the National Media Freedom Day. October 19th thus marked a very significant day in South Africa’s media industry.

Speaking at the event, Sanef’s Mondli Makhanya stressed confidently that another Black Wednesday was unlikely. Makhanya said it was unlikely that the media would be gagged again as was the case under the apartheid regime, and that the country was very far from that time.

Makhanya also indicated that current threats to media freedom include ANC’s proposed Media Appeals Tribunal (MAT). Journalists were as a result, urged to perform their duties top the fullest, and for the media to be self-critical.

One of the things that emerged during the event was that the media was not fighting its own struggles. It was indicated that the media was too much focused on other people’s freedoms and neglecting its own in the process; not hysterical about its own freedom as it is about other freedoms. Right2Know (R2K) Campaign’s Glenda Daniels indicated that media had not written anything relating to the event. Daniels also urged media to offer advertising space for R2K marches for media freedom as a way of fighting for its freedom.

A good case in point was the minimal coverage the event received not only in the run-up to the event as Daniels indicated, but also after. The New Age featured a snippet of the story on the corner of the second page titled “We never want another ‘Black Wednesday’”. The newspaper also ran a feature giving background to Black Wednesday titled “Redefining Black Wednesday”. Be that as it may, does the snippet of Black Wednesday commemoration indicate media’s certain level of apathy to report on its own struggles? The piece did not even mention Sanef’s 15th birthday, the National Media Freedom Day, and the launch of Guidelines on Reporting on Children in the Media launched by Media Monitoring Africa (MMA) on the same day, at the same event. Is the media apathetic to own struggles for freedom, we ask?

Still on other significant items of the day’s agenda, MMA launched Editorial Guidelines ad Principles on Reporting on Children in the Media which offer practical tips for media professionals on how to report and interview children. The guidelines have been compiled with input from children, journalists, editors and various media practitioners for African media. Journalists, media practitioners, children’s rights groups and anybody interested in how the media cover issues involving children can download a copy of the guidelines and principles by following this link.