April 06, 2009

Election Coverage 3 April 2009 – White Afrikaaners and Zuma

DEMOCRACY & GOVERNANCE RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS
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The outstanding decision by the NPA on whether Jacob Zuma would face charges was discussed on Friday 3 April with much comment.  However, most of this was not explicitly related to the election.  The election coverage continued in much the same way as previous coverage, with top stories also revolving around the ANC and Zuma.

1. Zuma’s comments about Afrikaaners being the only true white South Africans.

• Beeld, p. 1;
• Business Day, p. 3;
• SABC 3;
• The Citizen, p. 4; and,
• The Star, p. 4;

Some media quoted responses to this comment expressing concern over the implied ethnic and discriminatory nature of the comment.  SABC 3 also reported that the Centre for Constitutional Rights will be complaining to the South African Human Rights Commission about the comment.

2. The ANC’s response to Desmond Tutu’s statement that Jacob Zuma should go to court to clear his name. The ANC was reported as saying that Tutu was pandering to a minority and he had undermined the independence of the NPA.

• Business Day, p. 4;
• Sowetan, p. 16;
• The Citizen, p. 3; and 13 (editorial); and,
• The Star, p. 5.

The Times conducted an interview with Bantu Holomisa of the United Democratic Movement (UDM), although the interview was largely a platform for UDM campaigning rather than for an analysis of UDM policies. The coverage of parties other than ANC, DA or Cope has been so lacking as to make this interview quite remarkable.

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The following media are reviewed in the compilation of this report: Beeld, Business Day, Daily Sun, etv primetime news; SABC 3 primetime news; Sowetan, The Citizen, and The Star and The Times.

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