Statement from ODAC on the Alide Dasnois matter
The former editor of the Cape Times, Alide Dasnois, has now been dismissed as an employee of Independent Newspapers.
"We believe that the dismissal of Dasnois, who has worked on five of the Group's publications, on three of them as editor, and who was awarded the 2014 Nat Nakasa award for courage and integrity in journalism, has created a chilling effect among the editors and journalists in the Independent Group." said Alison Tilley, of the Open Democracy Advice Centre (ODAC).
In December 2013 Alide Dasnois was removed from her post as editor of the Cape Times and offered a position as the editor of a different publication within the Group.
The Group then took steps to terminate her employment relationship with it by instituting a disciplinary hearing which took place in May. She was charged with multiple charges, the most significant being the decision to run a story about a Public Protector report on Sekunjalo - the new owners of the Independent Group and therefore the Cape Times - as a front page lead on the morning after the death of Nelson Mandela. The Public Protector found, among other things, that Sekunjalo had benefitted from an R800 million a year government tender which was improperly awarded. She has now formally been dismissed.
Independent Newspapers says on its web site that it publishes more than 30 daily and weekly newspapers in the country's three major metropolitan areas, claiming aggregate weekly sales of 2.8 million copies and 48% of the total advertising spend in the paid newspaper market (more than twice that of any other newspaper group).