Where've all the voices gone?

Now is the time for those inspirational leaders of yesterday to stand up and help the country retain its press freedom

The President's spokesperson, Zizi Kodwa, speaks with forked tongue in calling on journalists to debate the merits of a media tribunal that has been instigated to silence discussion on abuse of power at the highest levels of society. But hypocrisy is an integral part of the respectable science of spin-doctoring, so no harm done.
However, in a condescending newspaper article, Kodwa concludes: "The chorus of condemnation by some with their indignation laid bare in the most vulgar terms, derogatory to the bone, lowers the level of debate and we should help these folks."
Far from making me vulgarly indignant, his patient words gave me the giggles. (Always laugh when you can: it's cheap medicine, Lord Byron advised long ago.) With President Zuma telling us solemnly that the proposed media appeals tribunal is intended to enhance free speech, the country's leader clearly doesn't see himself as the problem attracting the adverse media coverage he finds so derogatory. What a muddle he seems to be in.
But I wonder how his spokesperson plans "to help these folks"? By shutting us up? Locking us away in prison for up to 25 years?

It's laughable, albeit sickeningly so, that President Zuma is saying how hurtful he finds the comparisons being made with apartheid's power abuses at precisely the time his son is involved in one of the biggest scandals in South African corporate history - the ArcelorMittal affair.

Does the political elite want to read about a suspect mining deal involving the President's son and friends? Hell, no. Is it nevertheless in the national interest that details of this transaction be published for all to see? Unquestionably, yes.

We know from experience that most of the friction of daily life is due to the wrong tone of voice, one way or another, and the media's narrative in defence of its democratic status has clearly offended some powerful people - as the President's spokesperson has indicated.
Let's therefore hope that, in the short time remaining before these obnoxious measures become law, a few respected ANC (and non-ANC but pro South African) luminaries will join the "debate" now that journalists have done their vulgar best to keep politicians accountable for their actions.

Preserving press freedom needs to become the urgent mission of those South Africans honoured the world over for their courage in speaking truth to power. Such universally respected voices are not as easily scorned as the targeted local media. Already, foreign reports on the info bill and the proposed tribunal are worrying the Cabinet, according to chief government spokesman Themba Maseko. He stressed recently that the idea of a media tribunal was still in the ruling party and not yet government policy, despite Julius Malema's declaration: "We have already decided. We want Parliament to appoint a tribunal, make it law."

Oh come all ye dormant democrats! Albie Sachs: where are you? Cyril Ramaphosa and Roelf Mayer, creators of our Constitution; the fearless Archbishop Tutu; human rights guru George Bizos: your country needs your wise words.

Former head of the Constitutional Court, Arthur Chaskalson, has written authoritatively on subjects local and international. We need him to share his judicial conception of the role of the media in a constitutional democracy such as ours. Professor Nicholas Haysom, political adviser to UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, was the academic most closely involved in compiling our Constitution and he can warn South Africans in measured tones about the implications of the proposed media gags.

Lawyers, doctors, teachers, accountants: speak up while you can still be heard. For once, business needs to raise its voice against what is arguably the biggest threat to democracy since apartheid's demise. Where are the protests of Richard Maponya, Vincent Mophai… so vocal around the time of the fabulous Dinokeng Scenarios but now so silent?
Author Achmat Dangor of the Nelson Mandela Foundation should make himself eloquently heard in the interests of the legacy of Madiba, a champion of media freedom. Ditto Graca Machel.

Where are the voices of Joel Netshitenzhe, Kathy Kathrada, Barney Pityana, Jay Naidoo and Frene Ginwala: their silence is deafening.

And why are the ambassadors of Western countries, so vehemently opposed to Robert Mugabe's excesses in Zimbabwe, watching quietly as South Africa enters dangerously dictatorial terrain? Only the US ambassador has spoken out against the ANC's threatened media clampdown before the dirty deed is done.

All that's required for bad politics to prosper is the silence of the good guys. What the decent poet, Deputy Minister of Transport Jeremy Cronin, will tell his children and grandkids about his censorship collusion "in principle" is anybody's guess, but he should remember that history is a cruel judge. He and others could yet step down from their ANC posts rather than allowing party loyalty to pervert the freedoms for which they sacrificed so much.

This is no time to sit on one's hands: vote decisively and courageously against the proposed statutory media appeals tribunal and the misnamed Protection of Information Act. Don't rely on the courts to save us from these sinister laws: legal remedies could not rescue the corruption-busting Scorpions once the ruling party had decided to silence them.

With the ANC's firm majority in Parliament, both pieces of repressive legislation are likely to pass through the legislative stages, forcing the courts to try to avert a damaging breach of our constitutional freedoms. Politics will move again to the courtroom, as it did during the struggle against apartheid. South Africa's recently redeemed international reputation will be in tatters.
Now is the time for concerned citizens - especially those with high public profiles and widely respected voices - to make their views heard in the freedom of expression "debate".

The ANC's attack on the media will bring more problems than solutions for the government, making a mockery of the party's pretence of serving the public interest through censorship. Worst of all, though, the proposed press clampdown will leave South Africans clueless while corrupt politicians plunder their resources.