Speech by Piet Rampedi: Interim President of the newly established Forum of Journalists for Transformation (FJT) at the launch of that organisation, Hyde Park, Johannesburg, November 29 2015.
Our guests of honour, Prof. Shadrack Gutto and Prof. Somadoda Fikeni,
SANEF executive director and one of the FJT patrons, Mathatha Tsedu,
Forum of Black Journalists founding general secretary, Oupa Ngwenya,
Southern Sun general manager Jacques Heath,
FJT conveners, members and media colleagues in general,
And other dignitaries present,
Thanks very much for honouring us with your presence.
We are gathered here today under the umbrella of the Forum of Journalists for Transformation (FJT) to affirm the right of journalists, the foot soldiers of our industry, to represent themselves and defend the little gains scored since 1994.
We are here to examine why 21 years into democracy, predominantly black journalists are still discriminated against, subjected to less than desired working conditions and paid wages that are just enough to live another month.
We are here to ask ourselves critical questions about media transformation, and why those at the coalface of our industry are still vulnerable to unscrupulous owners and some of their kow-towing editors.
We are here to reflect on the reasons why there is still patriarchy and gender discrimination in the industry, with boardrooms and newsrooms still male dominated and skilled and experienced female journalists hardly given their due recognition.
We are here to take stock of why the industry still regards transformation as a subject not of its concern to direct attention to questions of ownership obligations to issues of staffing, diversity of perspectives and narratives to editorial content unhindered by commercial and party-political interests.
Prior to championing this agenda allow us to start by introducing our elders and veteran journalists who have agreed to serve as the FJT’s patrons for vision direction.
- Former Sunday Times and City Press editor, Tsedu.
- 2. Former World photojournalist Sam Nzima, who is famous for having taken the Hector Peterson June 16 picture.
- Former Union of Black Journalists member and political prisoner, Aunt Juby Mayet,
- Former SANEF secretary and Sowetan Kwazulu-Natal bureau chief, Marry Papayya,
- Former FBJ founding general secretary and Sowetan journalist, Ngwenya, and
- Veteran SABC journalist Abbe Makoe.
We have also issued invitations to other veteran journalists including Maud Motanyane, John Qwelane and former UBJ national organiser Bra Don Mattera and are awaiting their responses.
Their role will be to advise and guide us as we embark on this challenging but critically important struggle for the liberation of working journalists. I have been informed that Bra Don could not get give us feedback because he’s not feeling well. We wish him a speedy recovery.
These are men and women whose contribution to South African journalism serves as an inspiration for us. Working alongside other veteran journalists such as Bra Joe Tlholoe; Alf Khumalo; Thami Mazwai; Sam Mabe; Suzette Mafuna; Nomavenda Mathiane; Peter Magubane; Aggrey Klaaste; Obed Musi; Duma Ndlovu and many others, they embarked on a struggle of their own to transform our media during the dark days of apartheid.
Apart from being persecuted and jailed by the apartheid regime for merely doing their work, they also faced systematic problems at the time.
These included the criminalisation of journalism, racialised poor wages and privileges, monopoly of ownership by a small white minority and anti-black content. To describe their working conditions as poor would be an understatement. They were terrible.
Together with other journalists, they also launched or participated in industry bodies such as the Writers Association of South Africa, which later became the Media Workers Association of South Africa (MWASA), the South African Union of Journalists and others.
Naturally, the FJT’s establishment has enlisted mixed reactions.
A notion has been bandied about that we are a bunch of angry rascals and militants who want to threaten quality journalism, free speech and harmony in the industry.
We reject that notion as a deliberately dishonest characterisation of the FJT with the sole aim of intimidating, silencing and forcing us into compliance.
As Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe once said, “Let no one who is negative want to spoil what we are doing for ourselves in order to unite Africa.”
Just to steal from Argentinian born Cuban revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara, “there is no formula for a revolutionary struggle”.
So, we are not going to be told by our oppressors how we must liberate ourselves.
The FJT is an independent, non-profit think tank of working journalists, journalism students and academics that are committed to profound structural transformation of the media industry in South Africa.
It seeks to promote journalistic excellence and integrity by declaring war on a culture of institutionalised racism, cronyism, racially exclusive privilege and other experienced prejudices.
We serve as a pressure group to safeguard the interests of all journalists, particularly the media fraternity’s foot soldiers, by pushing for better working conditions, fair treatment and genuine transformation of our industry from an ownership and staffing point of view, as well as diversity of perspectives and narratives, and structural changes in the operating environment.
Our aims and objectives are to:
Campaign for fundamental transformation of the media industry from ownership to editorial content and the operating environment;
Fight and defeat a culture of institutionalised racism, prejudice, cronyism and related intolerances;
Campaign for policy and legal interventions to level the playing field and ensure commercial interests and the power elites do not undermine media freedom and free speech;
Fight for the interests of working class journalists at the coalface of the media industry by providing legal and moral back up against unfair discrimination, victimisation and retrenchments by the employers;
And to be voice of ordinary journalists in the public arena.
Let it be known, however, that we are not a trade union; we don’t aspire to be one and never will.
Questions have also been raised about whether we are going to mobilise along racial lines.
The answer is no, because we don’t believe every black person is a champion of transformation, in the same way we don’t believe every white person is an enemy of transformation.
There are black people with whom we have nothing in common regarding media transformation except skin colour. In the same way, there are white people with whom we have a lot in common regarding media transformation except skin colour.
Accordingly, we will treat everybody in terms of their attitudes and posture towards our policies, aims and objectives.
If you share our beliefs, you will have a seat at our dinner table irrespective of skin colour.
If you oppose transformation, you must know that you have declared yourself our enemy number one and we will treat you as such even if you are black. Ours is issue based.
Some might wonder why there is a need for a platform like the FJT when there are many media structures.
While there are bodies like the South African National Editors Forum (SANEF); the Right2Know; the Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI) and the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA), sadly, all of them do not speak for ordinary journalists.
They are completely removed from the wishes and aspirations of working journalists. In fact, apart from SANEF, the rest are sectarian, homogenous and reactionary groupings of friends and cronies whose common goal is to frustrate genuine transformation, defend the status quo and oppose the government and black excellence for ideological and political reasons.
They see their role as primarily being to defend the status quo at the expense of predominantly black poor and rural South Africans.
They are so sectarian and personal in their approach that their outrage is predictably selective and reserved for some media owners and/or editors.
For example, and for reasons known to them only, the leaders of these reactionary entities demanded to know who had funded Sekunjalo’s purchase of Independent Newspapers and why the new owners retrenched staff. However, they kept quite when BlackStar bought Times Media Group and later retrenched staff. They also said nothing when the Mail & Guardian later retrenched some employees.
Black Consciousness icon Steve Biko might have had the leadership of these bodies in mind when he condemned the posture of his white colleagues in 1960.
He said: “It is a community of people who sit to enjoy a privileged position that they do not deserve, are aware of this, and therefore spend their time trying to justify why they are doing so. Where differences of opinion exist, they are in the process to justify their position of privilege and their usurpation of power”.
Their public face is Anton Harber, who is introduced as a Wits journalism “professor”, even though he has no known PHD or even Masters Degree. He is probably the only professor in the world who supervises people who are three-times more qualified than him.
The same person who, today, is being celebrated as an anti-apartheid stalwart when he presided over a lily-white newsroom at the Rand Daily Mail when black reporters were discriminated against and subjected to the authority to their junior white colleagues (* see Anton Harber's response on these points appended below).
How we are so soon to forget. And for reasons known to him alone, he thinks black people need his permission to buy media houses or transform the industry.
In his lecture delivered at the University of South on November 3, 2015, Tsedu noted that black journalists were systematically discriminated against and their growth stunted.
“From the day the first black journalist was employed at a media house, he (it would have been he) was paid less, given inferior facilities to work with, and used separate toilets and canteen, even at highly liberal media houses professing to fight discrimination based on trace.”
“Thus black journalists like Zwelakhe Sisulu and Ameen Akhalwaya, just to name two, had to have their copy vetted by junior but white reporters at the Rand Daily Mail while serving under editors who are today celebrated as stalwarts of the fight against apartheid. Promotion was seriously stunted, and until the early 1990’s, there were very few editors who were actually black,” he said.
Sadly, the yoke of discrimination and inequality that burdened our predecessors is still on our shoulders today.
Working conditions are still as horrible as they were in the period described by Tsedu.
Promotion is still stunted for black journalists while some, like Sisulu and Akhalwaya at the time, are subjected to PR appointments. They are given senior positions with fat cheques without any authority, which is transferred to their junior but white colleagues.
The betrayal of the 1994 media transformation agenda we set ourselves as a nation, by the defenders of the status quo, has prompted us to rise to defend the little gains made since then.
Naturally, some might be asking why are we standing up now for transformation.
We are taking a stance because there have been a series of institutional issues reported in recent years, which show that we are still suffocating.
We all know what happened at Media24 when seven journalists tackled the issue of transformation at a bosberaad in 2013, in particular a lack of transformation, alleged discrimination and politically partisan reporting.
In response, the editor publicly accused them of “cultural superiority” and of the “racist mauling” of her white news editors. She laid an internal grievance of racism, divisiveness and cultural superiority.
Surprisingly, instead of using the race row to do self-introspection, encourage other possible victims to come forward and introduce measures to ensure racism and an anti-black corporate culture were uprooted, Media24 blamed the victims and tried to persuade them to drop the charges.
In recent years, the company has been destroying young, talented black editors by promoting them before forcing them out within a year or two on the pretext that they are incompetent or circulation had dropped on their watch. Some were given prominent positions but the authority transferred to their junior white colleagues.
For a media company that was the ultimate beneficiary of apartheid, you would expect them to naturally do more to help push for real transformation. It’s unacceptable for Koos Bekker, the company’s boss, to keep turning a blind eye to the situation.
At ENCA, the situation is worse than we originally imagined. The news agenda is controlled by a cartel of a few white males, who happened to be friends or cronies, despite the channel’s staff and viewers being predominantly black.
They oppress working class journalists, pay racialized low wages and victimise them for speaking out or joining a union. This was recently confirmed by staff in an anonymous letter leaked to the media.
They said even though the 24-hour news channel, e-Sat, had over 70% black employees and 87% black viewership, the editorial policy was still anti-black and anti-poor. And that head of news, Patrick Conroy, told them reporting on rural areas was pointless because “the middle class doesn’t care about the poor”.
ENCA Africa was shut down because of financial constraints and 30 employees were retrenched, but the bosses rewarded themselves with salary increases and performance bonuses. The company’s Afrocentric claim and connection to the continent stands revealed as a big lie.
The letter also said ENCA has a culture of discouraging union membership. Some employees are told at induction that they will be fired if they join a union.
This attitude on the part of ENCA news managers is not only condescending but its illegal. As it stands the company is refusing to recognise the union, which has already demonstrated significant membership.
The irony of all of this is that ENCA is majority owned by union SACTWU. We are obliged to ask SACTWU general secretary Andre Kriel why are the union has been turning a blind eye to the discrimination of staff by a company in which it owns a significant stake? What is their moral responsibility towards the victims? Are they serious shareholders or tokens who are happy to enjoy their return on investment irrespective of the abnormal working conditions under which that profit was made?
The company was built from the pensions of textile workers, and yet ironically the very same union, SACTWU which is a majority shareholder, is now an oppressor.
We are calling on Kriel to intervene as a matter of urgency to normalise the situation at ENCA or we will march on the channel.
SACTWU must also act against the culprits and take steps to ensure that the senior editorial team is reflective of the country’s demographics. And we are not talking about PR appointments where blacks are given big titles and fat cheques but no powers and authority.
The less said about the depressing situation at ANN7 the better. The company still treats staff miserably, pays degrading wages, undermines the country’s labour laws and pays no benefits like medical aid and housing allowances.
Journalists are not being graded and junior reporters are paid as little as R4 500 inclusive salary per month. The company sends reporters to cover stories as far as Free State and Limpopo without booking accommodation for them.
We want to put it to ANN7 and TNA owner Atul Gupta that we are not going to tolerate enslaving working conditions anymore. Neither do we find the debasing fear Guptas have injected to some of our ministers tolerable. Our democracy is not for sale.
At Times Media Group, where I work, there is an anti-union posture, lack of transparency in the restructuring process and a two-tier labour system where some hand-picked senior editors share in the company’s profit share schemes, while ordinary journalists share nothing except toilets and balconies.
Some journalists have been retrenched or have not received their annual salary increment and/or bonuses for two consecutive years, while a connected few were paid up to R150 000 each in the so-called profit share scheme.
We want CEO Andrew Bonamour to address these issues as a matter of urgency. We cannot bark at excesses in the public sector while failing to look at ourselves in the mirror and make that change.
At the SABC, our colleagues are subjected to mediocrity of leadership at the highest level, politically motivated interference in news reporting, cronyism, the violation of labour rights and an atmosphere of fear. Even the courts are failing to be listened to for sense to prevail.
Four editors were suspended for raising concerns about poor working conditions and salaries that were not commensurate with their jobs. Instead of the public broadcaster allowing the CCMA process to run its course, it victimised them further by accusing them of leaking their complaint to the media and subsequently icing them.
Some executives and senior editors still harass producers and presenters by sending daily SMSes accusing them of treating their cronies or favourite news subjects harshly for non-editorial reasons.
The situation is compounded by some politicians and government officials trying to run SABC newsrooms by remote control. The corporation is again leaderless and in a crisis mode, with CEO Frans Matlala suspended and COO Hlaudi Motsoeneng’s appointment set aside by the high court.
While we welcome the change of ownership at Independent, which contributed significantly to transformation of ownership and content, we have also received reports of low morale, understaffing and contractual issues there. We urge executive chairman Iqbal Surve to urgently address these concerns.
The situation is more or less the same at M&G. There is low morale uncertainty because the management has been running down the paper at the expense of staff. It eventually retrenched dozens of journalists and failed to pay salaries and service providers on time.
Cronyism is also rampant and the newsroom is still lily-white. Relatively junior and less experienced journalists are being appointed at the expense of their senior, skilled and experienced colleagues. We want owner Trevor Ncube to take action to reverse this anomaly.
These incidents and others have necessitated our decision to stand up because failure to do so would result in the little gains scored since 1994 being rolled back by the system.
In fact, our gains are being reversed already. The number of black editors and senior editors has reduced significantly compared to 10 years ago. Those whose views threatened the owners and the system have been forced out and replaced with black editors who are willing to comply in defence of the status quo.
As it was the case before 1994, the print media is still dominated by the big four – Times Media Group, Independent Newspapers, Naspers and Caxton.
Put differently, we are grappling with an untransformed media industry which is still in the hands of a few, but powerful individuals.
Under pressure from the champions of transformation, employer body the Print and Digitital Media South Africa (PDMSA) established the PDM task team in 2013 to look into whether transformation had happened. The probe was not concerned with media content but with key pillars of transformation in line with the BEE Act.
These pillars are equity ownership, management control, employment equity, skills development, preferential procurement, enterprise development and socio-economic development.
Their own probe found that the print media had failed to transform sufficiently in a number of key areas.
It said in part: “These failures are in the direct empowerment areas of ownership and management and control, as well as in the areas of skills development and employment equity with particular reference to women and the disabled.
The industry was however found to have done well in other ‘soft’ areas such as socio-economic development, preferential procurement and in some instances enterprise development.”
The team called for “strict implementation of the codes” and directed that “the annual targets that each company sets itself for compliance should be made public and that PDMSA conducts an industry performance audit and makes it publicly available”.
In response, print media owners not only refused to abide by the law, but chose to dissolve PDMSA and handle their affairs individually. That’s how far they are prepared to go to block transformation.
You might ask why we are concerned about monopoly of media ownership.
Ownership monopoly means that the few black produced and edited papers like Sowetan and City Press are white-owned.
Firstly, ownership monopoly is problematic and undesirable because it discourages competition, which affects content and salaries for staff.
Secondly, content remains skewed in favour of the urban middle class, whose issues are covered at the expense of their rural and poor counter-parts.
Thirdly, it allows media owners indirect control of content. Some of them do so by giving editors specific briefs or not allowing them to tinker with anything, especially content and the dominant narrative.
There is also a privately expressed feeling by some media owners that they have done their bit to contribute towards black economic empowerment and were now looking beyond blacks when appointing editors.
This is because most of them employed blacks as editors after 1994 out of a sense of guilt and to show acceptance of change. In some cases, competent and experienced black editors whose socio-economic and political outlook on life threatened the system have been replaced with those who willing to sing for their supper at the expense of transformation.
Gender discrimination is still rife in the industry.
In most cases, skilled and experienced female journalists are still overlooked for promotions in favour of their relatively junior and less-skilled male counterparts.
In fact, if you enter most newsrooms and boardrooms, you would be forgiven for thinking you are in a rugby field because key players are largely male.
A few women are promoted largely for PR reasons and stripped of their powers and authority.
Some editors do not support junior female news managers who are being pulled down by their male colleagues who just can’t accept female authority.
This is unacceptable because it perpetuates the stereotype that men are inherently smarter than women, which is a myth. As we all know, some men are useless as editors or managers.
There is rampant factionalism and racial solidarity in news reporting which manifests itself in cases where some editors and journalists openly defend some news subjects for obscure reasons irrespective of the facts.
This was seen with prominent stories like the Oscar Pistorius trial, the SARS rogue unit scandal, as well reportage on the NPA and IPID. Private sector corruption and irregularities, which involve predominantly white executives, are largely treated with caution and sympathy compared to public sector corruption, which involves largely black managers.
This was the case with the coverage of corruption by the companies that rigged tenders for the construction of 2010 Soccer World Cup related projects. That corruption was renamed tender “collusion” by some media outlets.
Accordingly, we demand that:
– All untransformed media houses set targets for real black ownership;
– A bargaining council for the media sector be introduced;
– Media owners invest in quality and specialised training programmes investigative and business reporters;
– Take deliberate steps to fight gender discrimination and patriarchy by appointing or promoting female journalists to senior positions in the newsrooms, and support them. And those positions must come with relevant powers and authority.
– Editors accommodate graduates from rural areas when recruiting interns;
> Journalists get access to benefits;
> An end to awarding to training contracts to the same well-connected individuals.
> Government intervene as a matter of urgency by introducing legal and policy frameworks to force the industry to transform. The state must also stop propping up untransformed media houses with taxpayers’ money by advertising in their media outlets.
We know ours won’t be an easy task. But we are prepared to forge ahead.
We expect the system and its functionaries will descend on us like a ton of bricks.
We know they will use some of the puppet editors to victimise us.
We know that performance issues will suddenly be raised against members of this forum in an attempt to silence them.
But we are ready for them. We are undeterred.
We have taken a conscious decision to liberate ourselves.
We understand it’s going to be a brutal struggle. But we are not going to retreat.
We are claiming our right to be our own guardians because we have lost confidence in the ability of the system and its functionaries to transform the industry structurally and meaningfully.
We have decided to challenge the system from within rather than bark when it is safe to do so.
We are refusing to be like some of our former colleagues who only found their voices after leaving the newsrooms to occupy cushy positions in both the public and private sector.
They are prepared to speak out when they have nothing to lose. Unlike them, we are not cowards.
We will speak out openly when we have everything to lose. And live with the consequences
But we have taken measures to protect our members legally in the event the system targets them.
We have approached a few sympathetic lawyers and firms to defend us pro-bono with a view to singing up with them once we are on our feet. Fortunately, two of them have agreed.
They will be on standby to offer telephonic advice and to defend our members against any unfair labour practice and/or victimisation.
We will also forge strategic alliances with progressive unions like the CWU and Mwasa on an ad-hoc basis.
We would also like to take this opportunity to announce the FJT’s interim leadership core, which would build the forum’s structures and organise an elective conference within 18-months.
President, Piet Rampedi (Sunday Times),
First Deputy President Denver de Wee (Media24),
Second Deputy President, Phakamile Hlubi (ENCA)
Chairperson, George Matlala (Sowetan),
Secretary-General Asanda Magaqa (ANN7),
Deputy Secretary-General Thabiso Thakali (Independent Newspapers),
Treasurer General Aubrey Mothombeni (Sunday World),
Deputy Treasurer General Bongiwe Mchunu (The New Age)
National Organiser Loyiso Sidimba (Sowetan)
We will announce members of our 30 member national executive committee in due course once the nominees have confirmed their availability.
We are pleased to announce the following cadres as our interim chairpersons and secretaries. They are automatically NEC members.
Limpopo:
1. Chairperson: Kgaogelo Magolego
2. Secretary: Glacier Nkwashu
Gauteng:
1. Chairperson: Amos Phago
2. Secretary: Dianne Hawker
KwaZulu-Natal:
Chairperson: Bongani Hans
Secretary: Nathi Olifant.
Western Cape:
Chairperson: Ayanda Ndamane
Secretary: Tshego Lepule
Mpumalanga:
Chairperson: Lolo Madonsela
Secretary: Motsibi wa Monareng.
Eastern Cape:
1. Chairperson: Monwabisi Jimlongo
2. Secretary: Phumza Ntongana.
North West:
1. Chairperson: Ellekia Dire
2. Secretary:
The interim FJT Free State and Northern Cape leaders will announced after nominations are finalised.
Lastly, we would like to take this opportunity to commend TMG for affirming three young, black editors at Sunday Times.
We wish newly appointed editor Bongani Siqoko, his deputy Sithembiso Msomi and managing edtor Moshoeshoe Monare well in their new roles.
However, we want to remind them that their jobs come with the responsibility to help transform our industry.
And they dare not absolve themselves.
I thank you.
This speech first appeared on www.ujuh.co.za
* Note from Anton Harber, Adjunct Professor of Journalism at Wits: "I do not represent Sanef, Misa or Right2Know, and have never done so. I was a junior reporter on the Rand Daily Mail and certainly did not preside over their newsroom, as Piet Rampedi suggests. He is correct that I do not have a PhD, but I have always been open about this. I am an adjunct professor and holder of the Caxton Chair in Journalism and Media Studies. It is common in journalism, business and other professional schools around the world to bring in those with experience (and I have 35 years of it) through an adjunct professorship."
