The orthopaedic surgeon Wynne Lieberthal accused The Star of destroying his and his family’s life after its journalists doggedly pursued complaints of malpractice against him. He was eventually struck off the medical practitioner’s register and, according to the Health Professions Council of South Africa, lost all his assets as a direct result of the negative (but probably fair) publicity.
“When does this all stop? When you have destroyed me and my family completely?” he asked a reporter after the council recently reinstated him as a doctor.
The argument in this article is not whether Lieberthal should have been reinstated or not, nor whether the coverage of the seven charges against him was too harsh.
It illustrates the power of the press once a journalist sinks his or her teeth into a story – regardless of whether it is print, broadcast or online – and refuses to let go until he or she sees results.
That is the kind of journalism that makes a difference to society and that is what we have been witnessing in the past months when it comes to crime.
There has been a turning point and it started with the ill-famed interview between Tim Modise and President Thabo Mbeki on January 15, further fuelled by First National Bank’s disastrous anti-crime campaign that never saw the light, but at least heightened debate in a media that had now turned angry. And rightfully so, considering Mbeki’s comments.
“It’s not as if someone will walk here to the studio in Auckland Park and get shot. That doesn’t happen and it won’t happen. Nobody can prove that the majority of the country’s 40-million to 50-million citizens think that crime is spinning out of control,” Mbeki said on the Lekgotleng le Modise television show flighted on the SABC.
His statement was a wake-up call to the media. Up to then, we had been covering crime, of course, but we had also become slightly blasé about it.
Crime coverage tripled
An informal study conducted by The Media proves the case in point. A quick glance at newspaper websites show that the number of articles on crime more than tripled between January 15 and February 15 this year compared to the same period last year. In these four weeks, Mbeki made his controversial crime-is-under-control statement, the FNB campaign was canned and the president delivered his State of the Nation speech.
On Gauteng newspaper websites that allow an advanced search by date, the number of articles with “crime” as a keyword shot up from 90 to 637 in Beeld (Jan/Feb 2007 compared to Jan/Feb 2006), increased from 91 to 355 in Business Day, grew from 171 to 322 in The Star, went up from 193 to 355 in the Sunday Independent and more than tripled from 24 to 85 in Rapport.
In Zulu newspaper Isolezwe, a search for “ubugebengu” (crime) produced nine results in Jan-Feb last year compared to 28 this year.
The newspapers that were excluded did not have a function for an advanced search by date on their websites. However, we also counted front pages devoted to crime in this period among Gauteng dailies and found that in some weeks, crime featured on newspaper covers every day. The Sowetan at times carried no fewer than six crime-related reports in one issue.
The results are non-scientific and would never hold up in court, but nonetheless indicate a trend showing that without exception, the media space devoted to crime in the first two months of this year had expanded.
The intensified coverage did produce some results if measured by Mbeki’s State of the Nation speech on February 9, nearly a month after his Tim Modise interview hit the headlines.
The president mentioned the word “crime” 16 times in his 18-page State of the Nation speech (the Sunday Times did the counting), and devoted 27 paragraphs out of 158 to crime.
This is compared to Mbeki mentioning crime only twice in his State of the Nation speech last year, perhaps signalling an about-turn in how seriously the government takes the situation.
Mbeki’s reply to parliamentary debate on his speech even caused Beeld – arguably the Number One crime reporter in the country – to congratulate Mbeki in an editorial the following day.
“This I must say: for 64 years I have never had either the ability or the courage or the need to resort to grand theatrical gestures,” said Mbeki.
“There will be no empty theatrical gestures, no prancing on the stage and no flagellation, but we will continue to act against crime, as decisively as we have sought to do throughout the years of our liberation. From us, from the government, will be issued no words that are lightly spoken.”
Beeld‘s editorial stated the next day: “Mbeki not only admitted his own personal shortcomings, but also showed that he had listened to criticism in parliament and in the media…”
How did the media manage to get the message across?
Pack journalism
It was a combination of events such as the Tim Modise show, the First National Bank crime campaign and the David Rattray murder that culminated in the intensified coverage across the entire media landscape – in print, broadcast, mobile media and online, including website campaigns such as that of trade union Solidarity/Solidariteit.
But rumblings had already started last year.
In October, the Sunday Times took the unprecedented step of publishing an editorial on its front page which stated: “The ruling party and the government it controls merely see crime as a problem, not the crisis that it is—
“This newspaper would like to suggest that, in-between the mandatory back-stabbing sessions— the ANC’s high-ups reserve some time for an in-depth discussion on this crisis. If they do not do so, it will confirm our worst fears: that they do not care.”
Crime was slowly creeping to the top as the Number One debate in the media, and when Drive Out journalist Megan Herselman, 49, was shot dead in June, South Africa’s biggest-selling magazines You and Huisgenoot launched a highly publicised petition against crime and a campaign to pay tribute to crime heroes.
Around the same time, writer André P. Brink, in the French daily Le Monde, described the government’s inaction on crime as the “tragic end to democracy”.
Many front pages were devoted to Judge Gerhardus Hattingh’s call for the reinstatement of the death penalty in his sentencing of the killers of four-year-old Makgabo Matlala, the granddaughter of Transvaal Judge President Bernard Ngoepe.
National police commissioner Jackie Selebi’s shady friendship with Glenn Agliotti, who has been arrested in connection with the murder of mining magnate Brett Kebble, hit newspaper headlines in November, causing a national outcry and call for his resignation.
Not only print was involved. Free-to-air channel e.tv continued to lead with crime stories when the public broadcaster chose safer options to report on, while the BBC broadcast a questionable documentary on Johannesburg as the so-called crime capital of the world and Selebi’s alleged “mafia” links.
But possibly the most powerful indicator of national sentiment was a viral sms campaign in January following Modise’s interview with Mbeki. The show ran a poll intended to test opinion on crime.
But the poll developed a life of its own as members of the public added a second sentence to the sms: “If u think crime is out of control in this country please SMS YES to 33588 for a survey for the Tim Modise show. Please forward this to as many people as possible to prove Mbeki wrong STAND UP TO CRIME.”
The wireless application service provider Marketel received an unprecedented 400,000 replies, a response too big to ignore.
A hard-hitting editorial in the weekly Mail & Guardian, entitled “A new age of denial”, likened Mbeki’s statement on crime on the Modise show to his denial years ago that HIV causes Aids.
“He is at it again: in his sonorous intellectual voice Mbeki has denied that crime is out of control. He is using and misusing statistics as he did at the height of the Aids denial. Now, as then, he is not feeling the (weakening) pulse of his people,” stated the editorial which was also read out to listeners on 702 Talk Radio.
“To wit, his letter to the nation on the party’s website last week: ‘In the face of a sustained campaign by some to seek political gain from the problem of crime, the people of South Africa need to maintain a steady focus— We cannot allow this important work to be diverted by the feverish denouncements that have preoccupied so many in the media in the (past) two weeks.'”
The media was feverish at that point, yes, but yet to follow was the murder of legendary Anglo-Zulu War expert David Rattray at his KwaZulu-Natal lodge. It was a story that made international headlines, causing further damage to South Africa’s bad crime reputation in the rest of the world. Rapport newspaper ran with the Prince of Wales expressing shock at the killing of Rattray, an old friend of his, on its cover. Meanwhile, international news agencies such as Reuters, Agence France-Presse and several British newspapers also reported on the killing, stepping up pressure on the government.
Then it became public knowledge that FNB had canned an aggressive anti-crime campaign. It sparked enormous debate on whether the R20-million campaign should have been cancelled or not. The media coverage on the withdrawal of the initiative probably gave the issue far more mileage than would have been the case if campaign just went ahead.
Meanwhile, shortly before the State of the Nation address, the London-based BBC flighted a documentary on crime in South Africa, described in the ruling African National Congress’ weekly newsletter ANC Today as “obscenely unfair”.
“BBC World was determined to ensure that what it had resolved to say about our country, it said at a moment that would make the maximum impact on our country’s national consciousness and agenda,” stated the newsletter which is often written by Mbeki himself.
“Fully understanding the importance of the State of the Nation address, it decided that it would broadcast the programme we are discussing on the very eve of this address, and not a day later or earlier.”
The newsletter continued to say that the programme was distorted and contained interviews only from crime victims in Hillbrow and showed apparently empty buildings in Johannesburg as a result of crime, while these buildings were in fact fully occupied. The BBC issued a statement saying it stands by its report.
While the British broadcaster is known among local reporters for sensationalising stories about South Africa, it is obvious that it too had picked up on increased activity in the coverage of crime.
The role of online
This increased activity was not only visible in print and broadcast – online sites joined in the fray.
Trade union Solidarity/Solidariteit created a crime website dearpresident.co.za, publishing an open letter to Mbeki, pointing out that crime was causing “grave damage” to South Africa. It offered visitors the opportunity to send an anti-crime message to the president online.
“Most importantly, it turns South Africans into negative, pessimistic and unpatriotic citizens. A country of which the citizens are scared and angry can hardly be a success,” the Solidarity website stated.
The trade union subsequently delivered 32,000 letters from crime victims to Mbeki in 30 wheelbarrows to the Union Buildings in Pretoria.
On another website, realsouthafrica.co.za, the letter FNB had intended to send Mbeki was made available to read and invited people to share their experiences of crime.
Meanwhile, a website called crimeisoutofcontrol.co.za was launched, asking browsers to give ideas on how to solve crime and write letters to Mbeki. This website is very different from the trashy crimeexposesouthafrica.org website, which carried sensational and racist crime reports, and was eventually forced to close down following some solid investigative reporting by The Citizen late last year.
This kind of passionate digging by journalists will continue. Already the peak in crime coverage that we saw in the first two months of the year is losing its momentum. But that is to be expected – there are other pressing issues waiting to be scrutinised. However, expect another few intense weeks in the media with the release of this year’s crime statistics. And with every peak, the media creates more pressure. There is nothing concrete in government action yet but heightened awareness is a start.
It might just prove that the pen is indeed mightier than the sword, and the handgun.
Research assistant: Tshepiso Seopa