A tarred road in pristine condition drifts across the Free State
grasslands towards a low, bushy mountain spur. There is no traffic here.
At the foot of the mountain is a monument proclaiming the defence of
‘Christian Civilisation’ past and present marking the spot where in
1836 the Voortrekkers fought their first major pitched battle against a
black impi. Welcome to Vegkop (or Vechtkop, in the original Dutch: battle
koppie).
Both sides are still claiming victory at Vegkop the blacks, under
Mzilikazi’s general Kalipi, because they drove off the Trekkers’ cattle
and sheep, and the whites because a handful of 30-odd men and boys
repulsed the Matabele impi of thousands. Fact is, this battle falls within
the grand narrative of history on both sides. President Mandela once
referred to Vegkop in the course of saying that blacks had fought to
retain their land.
But if grand narratives are the stuff of conflict, South Africa today is
in search of something less divisive. Stories of our intertwined lives are
not far to seek in the media, which work diligently to create a consensus
around a common destiny. Political correctness, however, may be facing a
populist revolt in the new black press.
Today the Vegkop road seems to run from nowhere to nowhere in the
emptiness of a history that has moved on. When built, it had no other
purpose but to carry the Afrikaner faithful to the monument, a symbol of
arrogance (or possibly ignorance) constructed in 1984 in the final decade
of white nationalist domination. At the time, the country was in an
uproar, riots in the townships, war on the borders, sanctions biting, and
nuclear weapons in development at Pelindaba.
The year 1984 marked the start of the Vaal Uprising which burst forth in
Sebokeng, not too far from the dour Free State platteland. It soon became
a wave of national protests against the Tricameral Parliament
(white-Indian-Coloured) and the apartheid system as a whole. This was the
year Bishop Desmond Tutu won the Nobel Peace Prize, just a year before
President PW Botha gave his infamous Rubicon speech telling the world to
get lost, apartheid would live on.
Racist oppression made it impossible for black journalists to remain
outside politics in the old South Africa. The permitted truths that
appeared in the self-censored white media beggared the mind and teased the
imagination. Who could believe what they read in their newspapers or saw
on TV it was all so obviously a put-up job. Reality was somewhere else.
The only question was whether you suffered it firsthand in the townships
or distanced yourself from it in the comfort in the suburbs.
In those days, the ‘alternative’ press came into being to combat both
apartheid and the misinformation of the establishment media. But something
else happened too within newspapers like the SA Council of Churches-backed
tabloid, The Voice. Founded in the mid-seventies it ran until its final
banning in the early eighties. Under editor Zwelakhe Sisulu it became a
black consciousness medium, promoting black culture and township
lifestyles and in this it anticipated much of what appears in the
popular tabloid press today.
A QUICK guide to the new black press would have to acknowledge that it is
not new at all. Of course the term ‘black press’ begs the question whether
racial categories belong with media any more, but let’s sidestep that one
to look at the new structures which may tell us something about race too.
Says Cyril Madlala, editor and part owner of UmAfrika in KwaZulu Natal,
and a journalist with good struggle credentials: “We are looking at new
opportunities and have found partners that want to go along with us.” The
partners? None other than Media24, the old Nasionale Pers, once a
powerbase of the Afrikaner Broederbond and nursery for nationalist
politicians.
Via the Natal Witness which Media24 owns, UmAfrika is entering a 50/50
partnership for a local community publishing venture. “Media24 has been
doing some good things for diversity and empowerment,” says Madlala,
“Also, we could do with some help to establish credibility amongst
advertisers, and it will be very useful to have access to some of the
systems in the group.”
Madlala himself is a former editor of the Saturday Independent in KZN as
well as a politicial commentator, once tipped as a possible editor of the
Sunday Times. He has been outspoken on racism in the media, but still
colleagues were surprised when he chose to jump off the establishment
bandwagon and go back to his roots at UmAfrika.
The struggle years pushed the establishment media into a limbo from which
they have never fully returned. Tainted by news suppression, riddled with
government spies, and identified with white business exploitation, the big
newspapers have battled to restore a semblance of objectivity and regard
for human rights.
The road that goes from nowhere to nowhere is history’s metaphor for the
‘white’ press. Despite what has been done to train and empower black
journalists, appoint black editors, and alter the news agenda to serve
wider communities, these papers are still widely mistrusted. And they have
been wide open to challenge.
The emergence of a populist black press suggests that a groundswell is
running against establishment definitions of modern SA reality. Pick up
the Daily Sun, Isolezwe, the Sunday Sun, or Sowetan Sunday World. These
tabloids take their inspiration more from the Mirror of London than
anything that ever rolled off the presses of responsible mainstream
publishers in SA.
Populism is that streak of publishing where crusading and muckraking meet
entertainment and street culture. It is also where new social movements
may be born that have got away from the political bosses of the day.
The populist press signals a realignment of reader preferences and a
vigorous revolt against mainstream press standards. Three features mark
out the tabloid upsurge as a notable departure for our media:
A dramatic increase in readers per copy (that is the ratio between ABC
circulation and AMPS readership figures). Poorer people share their
papers, and their ideas (see graph);
A remarkable broadening of popular black discourse to include
personalities, events and issues showing there is life beyond politics and
business;
And a self-help, DIY, make-a-success-of-life thrust in features and advice
columns, giving the people the tools to do for themselves what no-one will
do for them
An old ‘qualipop’ formula for newspapers wrapping the inside political
commentary, arts and culture between external folds of sensation and sport
has resurfaced. SIES! bellows the Sunday World on its front page,
“Outrage at used condoms and empty booze bottles in council chambers”, and
REAL LIFE DRAMA shouts the Sunday Sun, boosting the hit TV series called
Backstage.
To old-style defenders of rationalism, it is a deliberate, cynical
dumbing-down of the press to make money from simple readers and at the
same time impose a new form of mental slavery on the masses. The fact that
the inspiration to launch the Daily Sun came from a white journalist, Deon
du Plessis, now lionised in Business Day and Style magazine, confirms for
critics that the tabloids are a white conspiracy.
But to the Kwaito generation the kids of 13 to 30 whom ad agencies have
tagged as non-readers the new tabloid press comes as a godsend. The
street slang of rebellion Soweto, known as ‘tsotsitaal’ or ‘i’scamto’, has
become not just the ‘Kwaito lingo’ or ‘ringas’ but now defines an identity
for the freedom era, proving one is authentic and proud of township roots.
This is what the tabloids largely represent.
SOMETHING new is gathering force, and hints are everywhere in the talk of
the townships. Winnie Mandela is a heroine for diddling Saambou Bank, who
cares that she broke the law?; likewise for Alan Boesak and foreign aid
donors. Marike de Klerk’s killer is a victim of apartheid itself and
justice was served when he murdered the wife of a former white president.
The HIV-Aids lobby, including the Treatment Action Campaign, is a
conspiracy with foreign pharmaceutical companies to discredit our beloved
Health Minister.
This last idea was expressed by the publicity secretary of the ANC Youth
League in an article in Sowetan. No doubt the Minister was thrilled by the
support, but it comes from an extreme direction in language so irrational
that it must have today’s ANC leaders worried about what tomorrow holds.
“The real battle is in the failure of a generation of new mainstream
managers to cope with the market signs, and with delivery,” says an
industry analyst (who did not wish to be named). “Most are jumped-up
journalists with no managerial understanding or training for the job of
publishing.”
If some journalists did not see it coming, others did. Still others are
not going to go that way and will follow the high road of quality
journalism for the sake of our new democracy and of Africa as a whole
like publisher Trevor Ncube, who recently acquired the Mail&Guardian; and
John Matisonn, editorial director of the soon-to-be-launched ThisDay
newspaper. Both are pursuing the top LSM segments of the market where the
decision-makers are to be found.
Mainstream media can be described, somewhat loftily but still truly, as
part of the project of modernity bringing information, debate and
reasoning to the job of understanding and running a country. The end of
apartheid has redefined this job as one of national development and even
nation-building (an ideal first flighted by Aggrey Klaaste of the
Sowetan).
“ThisDay aims to be a national, general, quality, rainbow daily
newspaper,” says Matisonn of his creation which has been months in the
making and is due to appear any day. “We are not going to paper over the
cracks in Africa. But we believe there is now a critical mass of South
Africans doing business in Africa who will welcome an independent-minded
medium.”
The goals have yet to be tested against publishing realities. In Nigeria,
ThisDay ended up apologising profusely to the Muslim public and political
authorities after an inflammatory article buried on page 50 of the paper
caused riots in the northern city of Kaduna. Radical Muslims burned down
ThisDay’s office after the Prophet Muhammad was referred to in an article
about the Miss World beauty pageant.
How does that bode for press independence anywhere in Africa? “Our
philosophy is to be independent but sensitive to community issues. As one
of the first papers to be born in freedom in South Africa, we plan to have
an African perspective and promote democracy, free enterprise and social
justice,” says Matisonn.
The press alone mainstream or populist cannot construct a new Africa,
but maybe can set the agenda. It’s not a simple battle between black and
white. The grand narrative of democracy is up for discussion. <ends>
Graeme Addison is a former Professor of Communication at the University of
North West, Mafikeng, who completed a study of emergent black newspapers
for Print Media South Africa last year.