Writers threatened by apartheid say they are now being threatened once more, this time by the new Protection of Information Bill and Media Tribunal which is really just another form of censorship.
South Africa’s top authors including Nadine Gordimer, André P. Brink, Zakes Mda, Abraham H. de Vries, Chris Barnard, Breyten Breytenbach, Marlene van Niekerk, Zoë Wicomb, Damon Galgut, Mandla Langa, Etienne van Heerden, Hermann Giliomee, Fred Khumalo and Justice Malala have issued a joint statement warning against the Protection of Information Bill.
The statement says muzzling media freedom affects media in the responsibility and necessity of their function. “..which is to keep citizens informed of all aspects that affect life in the country, whether by government edict, the law, economic practice, or the ethical standards of individual behaviour.”
The statement says denial of freedom of expression makes a mockery of the profession of journalism. But the writers are also unanimous in saying that freedom should be not granted for hate speech in any form, including advocation of violence. They point out that the Constitution deals with inflammatory speech. “Bill of Rights. Freedom of expression. The right does not extend to a) propaganda for war, b) incitement of imminent violence; or c) advocacy of hatred that is based on race, ethnicity, gender or religion, and that constitutes incitement to cause harm.”
The writers say they are now threatened by denial of freedom of the word. Among the signatures included in the campaign are those of writers whose work was banned under the apartheid regime. They say they are threatened again “(With a) .. a gag over the word processor if we penetrate the ‘transparency’ promised in the new South Africa, which a Media Tribunal will replace with the descent of a shutter over the dialogue of the arts in the attempt of understanding who and what we are, where we come from and what we may yet become.”
They say the Media Tribunal is really just a pseudonym for censorship and “...so, if the work and the freedom of the writer are in jeopardy, the freedom of every reader in South Africa is in danger. Consequently our protest is an action undertaken by South Africans for all South Africans, committing ourselves to a demand for our free country: freedom of thought expressed, freedom of dialogue, freedom from fear of the truth about ourselves, all South Africans.”
The full text of the statement by the South African Writers can be found here.
Source: Business Day
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