Another editor bites the dust

Vusi Mona, the editor of City Press, has resigned, it was reliably learnt on Wednesday morning by the Mail & Guardian Online. Mona has been at the centre of a media ethics row, accused of having outside business interests and a share in a public relations company doing work for the government .

Mona would not confirm his resignation when the Mail & Guardian Online spoke to him this morning.

In late October, Mona was accused in an article in The Star newspaper of having a share in a public relations company that had been doing work for the Mpumalanga government. Mona, at the time, emphatically denied “any wrongdoing or corruption”, but critics said it constituted a conflict of interest with the paper.

Andre le Roux, deputy editor of City Press, said he could neither confirm nor deny Mona’s resignation.

“We will be making a statement at an appropriate time, and I suggest you wait for that,” said Le Roux.

The Mail & Guardian Online first got wind of the resignation by way of a cellphone text message.

The SMS read: “Have resigned as city press editor. Full statement tomorrow. Cleared on Star allegations. Found wanting on disclosure. Parting amicably with employer. Thanks for support. V Mona”.

Media 24, publisher of the newspaper City Press, hired an independent legal investigator to look into the allegations against Mona. Throughout the affair, Mona denied any wrongdoing and offered to stand down as editor while an investigation into the possible conflict of interest was conducted.

Mona has been reported to be a director of one of three companies trading as Rainbow Communications and Rainbow Kwanda Communications. The companies are responsible for advertisements, marketing, public relations and media liaison for Mpumalanga.

They are also behind a recent advertisement placed in various newspapers, including the City Press, accusing the media of lying, bribery, intimidation and the theft of three damning audit reports that outlined corruption in the Mpumulanga health department.

Other allegations against Mona published in The Star in October include claims that he and his business partner, Dr Moss Mashamaite, secured a R395 000 contract from the Mpumulanga Parks Board for Rainbow to improve the board’s public image.

The six-month contract allegedly involved a planned public relations campaign that included negotiating with journalists, pitching stories to the media, booking advertising space in newspapers and booking press events. However, it is alleged that Rainbow Communications might also have been paid by the Mpumulanga government for work it did not do.

The office of Mpumalanga Premier Ndaweni Mahlangu also paid Rainbow R3 686 586 for billboard displays and advertisements on buses and taxis and in a number of publications. Most of the advertisements have not appeared or even been

booked, said The Star.

Mona and the City Press have also featured prominently in the Ngcuka spy probe allegations involving former Sunday Times journalist Ranjeni Munusamy.

Munusamy leaked the Ngcuka story to City Press after former Sunday Times editor Mathatha Tsedu refused to publish it. It is alleged that National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka was an apartheid spy — the subject of the ongoing Hefer commission investigations.

Mona is the second high-profile editor to fall after Tsedu was unceremoniously given the sack on Saturday by the paper’s publishers, Johnnic Communications, for failing to grow the circulation and readership in the upper reader market segment, and also failing to hold on to senior staff.

Tsedu said he was caught in a bind between serving the majority of the paper’s readers, who are black, and producing a paper that white advertisers saw as “upwardly”. He said his efforts to make South Africa’s best-selling Sunday paper more Africa-focused were seen by some advertisers as a “dumbing down” of the paper.

The Naspers-owned City Press is the biggest English newspaper aimed at the black market and the third-biggest newspaper in the country. According to its website, it has a readership of 2 500 000. It was established in 1982 as the first national Sunday newspaper aimed at the black market.