The Western Cape government is not investigating claims that two senior Cape Town newspaper journalists have been secretly working for the premier’s office.
”What should the province investigate?” asked Makhaya Mani, spokesperson for acting premier Leonard Ramatlakane. ”I don’t know at this stage if there’s anything the province must investigate.”
The two journalists have been suspended by their employer, the Cape Argus, pending the outcome of an investigation launched by its editor, Ivan Fynn.
Mani said he was ”not aware” of suggestions that the pair had been paid for media work to brush up the image of Premier Ebrahim Rasool. Rasool is overseas at the moment.
”The issue you are raising now, we would want to be dealt with by the company that employs the two gentlemen,” he said. ”It is happening at an independent company.”
He did not know whether the premier’s office had been asked to cooperate with the Argus probe.
Earlier, the Democratic Alliance’s spokesperson on corruption in the province, Robin Carlisle, said the controversy is serious enough to require both investigation and straight answers.
”The allegation is that the two journalists have been paid to give Rasool favourable publicity,” he said. ”If this is the case, Rasool as well as … the two journalists would have thoroughly destroyed their credibility, and the premier and the journalists would have to resign from their positions.”
However, it is the DA’s ”experience” that neither of the journalists ”have been bribed or are bribable”, he added. — Sapa