The journalists in South Africa must be exposed if they are corrupt and I support the ANCYL on this one
There has been a lot of fanfare about the ANCYL spokesperson's dossier which seeks to reveal all the journalists' shenanigans. Although I don't condone such tactics but I do also believe that it is a necessary evil. I am not a fan of the ANCYL nor its spokesperson nor its president either. I don't believe in the law of the jungle since it states that you live by a philosophy of, "kill or be killed". As a God fearing Christian but not an indoctrinated one, I don't believe that if one slaps you, you must turn the other cheek either.
For this reason I declare that it is entirely justifiable for the ANCYL to fight fire with fire after all they find themselves in the jungle infested with monsters called journalists. Let me hasten to add that I don't hold anything against journalists and instead I believe that they too are a necessary evil. I firmly believe too that one needs to keep or maintain a cordial relationship with the media. But I ask, what do you do when they show you a thick middle finger and try to score cheap points at your expense?
I have worked with some journalists before and I still do - incidentally I also grew up with some of them. I thus hold no vendetta nor do I resent them but I condemn the way they conduct themselves at times. For this reason, I honestly do not see anything wrong in what Mr. Shivambu has done. Equally, I do not see anything wrong when journalists sincerely expose corruption or when they reveal the abuse of powers to benefit individuals instead of the public they serve either.
Where I have a problem though is when these journalists pry into other people's lives and invade their privacy under the guise that it is the public's right to know (or it is in the public interest to expose such) whereas they are actually driven by ulterior motives. At no point or no-where in our constitution does it state that, "by virtue of having taken government or political office, you therefore automatically lose the protection of a right to privacy."
So where therefore do our journalists, commentators and analysts get this crazy idea that politicians do not have a right to privacy? Some or most journalists are usually at pains to convince us (the public) to believe that our leaders, particularly the ANC's have no scruples or morals. In the process they project themselves as a voice of reason and one that has the public's interest at heart. This however couldn't be further from the truth because those of us who have investigative researching prowess know very well that the only real interest these journalists have is their back pockets and those of their employers.