March 04, 2009

3 March 2009 – Zille Rallies while IEC Puts its Foot Down

DEMOCRACY & GOVERNANCE RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS
By admin 83 Comments

Media Monitoring Africa has monitored every democratic election in South Africa. This year we are doing the same, providing daily[1] and weekly reports on media coverage of election news, as well as MMA’s Election Media Ratings[2].

Top stories for Tuesday, the 3 March are:

1. IEC deadline for party lists, with various parties mentioned, with particular attention being paid to Cope.
• Beeld, p. 11;
• Business Day, p. 1;
• Daily Sun, p. 3;
• Sowetan, p. 4;
• The Citizen, p. 3; and,
• The Star, p. 1, 6.

2. Helen Zille and various statements and rallies.
• • Business Day, p. 1 (Wits rally);
• • The Citizen, p. 4; (Wits rally, other DA statements on
condomns and race also appeared);
• The Star, p. 6 (response to Allan Boesak’s comment about DA
not having made a difference to people in Cape Town); and,
• The Times (response to Boesak).

Both etv and SABC 3 carried items focused on Shabir Shaik’s release from jail on medical parole, with SABC 3 quoting the views of various political parties on the issue. More coverage is expected in the print media for Wednesday.

Business Day’s Karima Brown did an analysis of the ANC list and what it would mean for women and the poor, expressing concern about the track records of a number of the members on the list (p. 13).  This is one of the first analyses that explores the ANC’s list and its potential impact on people, and the need for effective political service. On the same page, Paul Hoffman used provisions from the South African Constitution to frame an analysis of a few people on the ANC list as well as Cope’s Allan Boesak around their eligibility for office. Both pieces sought to explain election-related issues and their impact on ordinary citizens, and in so doing serve to inform citizens.

The media monitored clearly missed an opportunity to link the removal of a refugee shelter north of Pretoria to broader issues around xenophobia and migration.  While many media mentioned the issue of xenophobia there was no analysis of it and the link between xenophobia and migration, which should be addressed as an election issue.  While on the surface, it may not appear that migration is an election issue, in order for South Africa to meet its developmental needs it is going to have to draw on much-needed skills of non South Africans.  This means that not only is migration an election issue in terms of the Department of Home Affairs treatment of non South Africans, but it is also an issue for the Departments of Health, Safety and Security, Trade and Industry and Education.

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For more information please contact Sandra Roberts on 084 9000 344 or 011 788 1278 or William Bird on 082 887 1370.
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1. The following media are reviewed in the compilation of this report: Beeld, Business Day, Daily Sun, e-tv primetime news, SABC 3 primetime news, Sowetan, The Citizen, The Star, and The Times.
2. Please note our full-scale elections monitoring is still in process.  Let us know if you would like your media to be included in the analysis.