Committee agrees to meeting with Facebook 

16 February 2021

Note to Editors: Please find attached soundbite by Phumzile Van Damme MP.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) is pleased that the Committee of Communications and Digital Technologies has agreed to invite Facebook to meet with the committee.

We trust that Facebook, in good faith, will accept the offer to appear before the committee, in order to build a relationship with Parliament and clarify concerns.

From the DA’s perspective the aim is not to use the opportunity to shut down protected freedom of speech but to deal with the proliferation of fake news in its form as disinformation and misinformation, as well as protecting the people of South Africa against harmful Hate Speech that could result in violence.

While the company has committed to strengthening content moderation their efforts are usually focused on countries that are global powerhouses like the United States, the European Union and others, like our own, are not a priority.

Importantly, Facebook Africa needs to provide a plan on what steps it will be taking in tackling misinformation ahead of the 2021 Local Government Election, as it has done for elections in other parts of the world.

The DA is of the firm belief that our election campaign must happen in a manner where all South Africans, regardless of political affiliation, are able to consider all the electoral offers without being manipulated with misinformation or the weaponisation of their private data as we saw in the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

We look forward to what we hope will be a fruitful discussion with Facebook.

Issued by Phumzile Van Damme,DA Member of the Portfolio Committee on Communications & Digital Technologies, 16 February 2021