Watch: Al Jazeera debates South Africa’s media war

Presenters Femi Oke and Omar Baddar were joined by media personality Redi Tlhabi, Right2Know activist Micah Reddy, and University of Johannesburg professor Jane Duncan, not to mention The Stream’s opinionated social media community.

Reddy warned of “a very systematic, very concerted attempt by a faction of the ruling elite to capture state institutions, and in this case to capture the most important media institution in the country. Of the 12-13 million TV-owning households, about 7m of them rely almost exclusively on SABC for their news coverage. It is the most influential media machine in the country.”

He added, “Things have suddenly got particularly bad. We’ve seen the most egregious forms of censorship lately; it’s worse than anything we’ve seen before since the broadcaster was transformed in the early 1990s.”

SABC maintains the move was to protect journalists from becoming victims while covering violent protests, but Reddy dismissed this and similar defences. “The decision to suspend three journalists for objecting to a directive from above not to cover a Right2Know protest, a peaceful protest, gives lie to claim that the ban on covering violent protest is about respectability and dealing sensitively with violence. This is outright censorship; there was no violence at our protest.”

Tlhabi compared the current situation to the 2006 banning of an “innocuous” documentary on former South African president Thabo Mbeki she co-produced. “In that instance, there was no directive from the president to censor the documentary; the SABC – wanting to impress political leadership – just banned it… This time around in 2016 we are seeing a brazen and blatant censorship. This time around, it isn’t just the SABC censoring itself; it’s doing it with the support of the ANC.”

“There is a cycle taking place here we need to recognize,” said Duncan. “About 10 years ago, there was case involving the former managing director of news and current affairs who blacklisted political commentators who were critical of the government. At that stage, when there was a succession battle taking place between then president Thabo Mbeki and the contender Jacob Zuma, there was a power grab on the SABC. Now we’re seeing an even more serious power grab on the SABC, and I think it’s even more serious because not only are we seeing a looming succession battle that is likely to play itself out in a massive way after the local government elections, but we are seeing declining electoral fortunes on behalf of the ANC at the polls.”

Jimi Matthews resigned as acting SABC CEO recently and has spoken out about censorship at the state broadcaster. “It’s better late than never,” Tlhabi commented. “But to be fair and objective we need to acknowledge that he himself has made very detrimental decisions in supporting the powers that be at the SABC and in the ANC for that matter.”

Communications minister Faith Muthambi dropped out of the show an hour before broadcast when her spokesperson said he was “at the cinema” and could no longer confirm the minister’s participation.

Two suspended SABC journalists also both cancelled on the day as “they were afraid to be on the program,” according to Oke.

The guests also discussed whether comparisons to Apartheid South Africa were justified; how you can create a wall of separation between state broadcasters and the state that funds them; and the SABC’s responsibilities to its other key funders: license holders and advertisers.

Ending the show, Reddy promised “rolling mass action for the foreseeable future until something is done to stop the rot at the SABC.”