FXI Update -- September 1995
Freedom of Expression Diary -- September 1995
August 30
The Independent Broadcasting Authority's report to parliament is released.
The report contains wide-ranging recommendations pertaining to South African
Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), independent broadcasters and cross-media ownership.
August 31
The Executive Director of the Constitutional Assembly (CA), HassaEbrahim,
informs the CA's management committee that there will likely be a delay of 6 months
in the adoption of the new constitution. The original target date was May 10,
1996.
September 2
The South African Press Association (SAPA) reports that a row is brewing in
Kenya following the recent launch of a television channel - a joint venture by
South Africa's M-Net and the state-funded Kenya Broadcasting Corporation. Critics
claim that while the new station is state-funded, it will serve the cause of
the ruling Kenya African National Union.
September 4
Algerian political cartoonist, Brahim Garoui, who sketched for the daily El
Moudjahid, is found shot dead. He had been kidnapped from his home in Algiers
by armed men two days earlier.
Reports from India say that Shiv Sena, an ultra-nationalist Hindu party based
in Bombay has threatened British author Salman Rushdie following the publication
of his latest book, "The Moor's Last Sigh." Earlier, Indian distributors decided
against releasing the book in Bombay.
September 5
The Constitutional Court hold public hearings on the validity of the current
pornography laws. A wide range of submissions are heard.
The Committee to Protect Journalists reports that Somali journalist, Ali Musa
Abdi, and two colleagues are arrested in by several armed men in southern Mogadishu.
Abdi is a stringer for the British Broadcasting Corporation and Agence France
Presse. Those arrested with Abdi are released immediately, but Abdi remains in
detention.
The International Federation of Journalists announces that it is to open a
media centre in the Algerian capital, Algiers, next month to help journalists
and other intellectuals who have become the targets of recent terror attacks.
The IFJ says that 41 journalists have been killed in Algeria since May 1993.
September 6
The South African National Assembly unanimously passes the State of Emergency
Bill. The bill provides for a State of Emergency to be declared in situations
of war, invasion, national disasters and general insurrection. Five parties register
their reservations about the bill.
A car bomb is set off near an Algerian television transmitter in a suburb
of Algiers. TV technician, Omar Gueroui, is killed at the scene.
September 8
The SABC rejects a Weekly Mail & Guardian advert scheduled to be flighted
on Radio Highveld. The ad, produced by Net#work, deemed to be blasphemous by
the SABC, but was flighted on 702 without any complaints. The ad uses an angelic
choir with a voice-over including the lines: "On the first day his gaze fell on
the headline news and weekend guide. On the second, he forsook work and indulged
in sport. On the third day he partook of global and local views. On the fourth
day, he returned to business. On the fifth day the entertainment section found
favour." It continues: "And on the seventh day he saw that what he had read was
good ... and sallied forth to buy the next edition."
In Somalia, General Mohammed Farah Aideed announces that journalist Ali Musa
Abdi has been arrested and will be tried for serious offenses against the country.
September 11
Central News Agency (CNA), South Africa's largest retailer of magazines, releases
guidelines which places restrictions on the display of pornographic material
in its shops. Among the guidelines is that the company will not sell magazines
which contain photographs that show child sex, bestiality, necrophilia, incest,
sex and violence, explicit sexual intercourse, masturbation, oral sex, an erect
penis and close shots of the vaginal area.
Algerian media workers embark on a three-day strike to highlight their plight
as targets of recent terror attacks.
September 16
President Nelson Mandela announces the nine-member panel who will draw up
the short-list of people to be appointed as commissioners to the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission. The panel is made up of: Professor Nicholas Haysom (panel chairman),
Brigalia Bam of the South African Council of Churches, Baleka Kgositsile (MP),
Senator R Radue, Senator Rossier de Ville, Methodist bishop Peter Storey; Jody
Kollapen of Lawyers for Human Rights, Jayendra Naaidoo and Professor Harriet
Ngubane.
September 19
Section 205 of the Criminal Procedure Act, which compels witnesses to answer
questions put to them in a court of law, is referred to the Constitutional Court
to determine whether it is constitutional. This piece of legislation was often
used against journalists to force them to reveal their sources.
n The Parliamentary Communications Committee announces that it will hold public
hearings from November 6 to 10 on the IBA's inquiry and subsequent recommendations
pertaining to broadcast policy and SABC restructuring. However, the committee
says it will not re-open the inquiry, and will only hear submissions on the viability
of public broadcasting and cross-media ownership.
The Managing Director of Dispatch Media (an independent media house in the
Eastern Province) confirms that Times Media Limited is poised to take over East
London's Daily Dispatch newspaper. If successful, Times Media will control four
of the Eastern Province's SIX newspapers.
September 20
Namibian police clamp down on sex shops in various parts of the country, closing
down five shops and confiscating pornographic material. The action is done in
terms of the Combating of Immoral Activities Act of 1980, the Publications Act
of 1974 and the Indecent and Obscene Act of 1967. All of these legislations were
inherited from the period of South Africa's occupation of Namibia.
September 24
The government of Swaziland bans five South African porno magazines, describing
them as "filthy publications which serve only to destroy the moral standards of
children".
September 27
The editor of City Press, Khulu Sibiya, resigns as head of the predominantly-white
Conference of Editors. In a letter to fellow editors he says his efforts to unite
black and white editors had failed. He goes on to say that the battle in South
Africa is no longer about press freedom and freedom of expression, but rather
media diversity and ownership.