Speech by Jane Duncan entitled 'On libraries and intellectual self-defence', given at the World Library and Information Congress, Durban International Convention Centre, 22 August 2007

At the opening of this conference, the President of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, Alex Byrne, argued that librarians and information workers are obliged to ‘continue to fight against the persecution and punishment of those who express their opinions and of those who seek to provide access to information, however repugnant we might find their opinions or information’.[1] Byrne argued further that librarians and information workers will be unable to promote access to information without defending intellectual freedom. In these comments, Byrne points to the inter-relatedness of the rights of access to information and freedom of expression, and further how advocacy around the protection and promotion of both rights should be central to the work of library associations. What one can also infer from Byrne’s statement is that librarians must defend intellectual freedom in relation to libraries, but should also defend intellectual freedoms beyond the library’s walls. After all, f we do not value our free thinkers, our critical intellectuals, we will not value our libraries.

We hope that this conference will be a platform for building stronger relationships between library and information workers and the free expression and access to information movements. It seems trite to say that globally, freedom of expression is under severe strain. The events of 9/11 have precipitated wide-ranging anti-terrorism measures in an attempt to beef up national security; a number of these measures have impacted negatively on civil liberties, including freedom of expression and access to information. Information security has become more and more difficult to guarantee, and countries that have projected themselves as bastions of freedom of expression have taken to eroding its basic tenets, such as the need to protect journalistic sources of information. These erosions of the external freedom of expression environment will inevitably bear down on libraries. 

The increasing concentration of the media and publishing industries is also placing strain on the diversity of information, as the barriers to entry to indigenous publishing are raised. In some cases – for instance in Rupert Murdock’s papers during the invasion of Iraq – the concentration of media has made surveillance and silencing of dissident views easier as it allows owners and managers close to political and economic power to impose single, patriotic, editorial lines. Even academic freedom in the United States (US) is now reportedly under attack, with organisations like the American Association of University Principles (AAUP) fighting attempts by the US administration to root out dissident academics. 

The scale of governmental and mainstream media disinformation in the leadup to the war in Iraq led Noam Chomsky to argue for the need to develop what he calls a ‘sceptical reflex’, as part of a course of intellectual self-defence. This course requires the ability to think independently and the desire to think critically, as well as some hard work. He argues: ‘You’re going to have to compare today’s lies with yesterday’s lies and see if you can construct some rational story out of them. It’s a major effort’. He warns that ‘you have to decide to become a fanatic…You have to work, because nobody’s going to make it easy for you’. This course of intellectual self-defence entails a ‘willingness to look at the facts with an open mind, to put simple assertions to the test, and to pursue an argument to its conclusion’.[2] This sort of thinking can change lives. If combined with action, it can even stop countries from going to war for dishonest reasons. It is small wonder then, that this sort of thinking that under attack in many of our institutions. 

Library and information workers have a key role to play in providing the resources to inform critical thinking. Byrne identifies the moral basis of the librarian’s profession as a commitment to access to information. The fact that the profession has a moral basis means that it can never merely be a job; in certain respects it is a calling. Critical intellectual engagement, too, has a moral basis: as Chomsky has argued ‘the responsibility of the writer as a moral agent is to try and bring the truth about matters of human significance to an audience that can do something about them. This is part of what it means to be a moral agent rather than a monster’.[3] 

The global decline in free expression has led to debates in the free expression field about why we are failing to protect spaces for critical engagement. In the past year, a discussion has emerged in the global network of free expression organisations, the International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX) about how it does its business. IFEX was established in 1992 as a global network. This means that it cannot behave as an organisation; it cannot, for instance, take positions on particular freedom of expression issues. It also does not launch campaigns in its own name, but assists its members to come together to launch joint campaigns. 

We have started to debate whether this approach suffices. Last year, the highest number of journalists were killed since 1994. Attacks on the media and free expression increase exponentially, in spite of the existence of – according to Nick Fillmore – more than 100 free expression groups that spend in excess of US$15-million a year.[4]  If more freedom of expression groups exist than ever before, and yet the global free expression environment is deteriorating, then surely we are doing something wrong?

Another crucial point we are discussing is that, increasingly, heightened repression flows from the co-ordinated efforts of different countries. So if the forces of censorship and repression are forming stronger coalitions of interest, can we afford not to coordinate efforts too? To this end, we in IFEX have begun to debate the adoption of a strategic plan, which seeks to identify and work to eradicate the main threats to free expression in the world today. We have also, with other African free expression organisations, formed the Network of African Free Expression Organisations (Nafeo), where we are beginning to address censorship on a Pan-African basis. I mention this because it may of interest to this congress that many IFEX members are starting to arrive at the conclusion that, if we are to have a global impact, then we need to be much more targeted and organised. In arriving at this plan, it will be important for IFEX members and the IFLA Committee on Free Access to Information and Freedom of Expression to consult extensively.

But what we have learned in the Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI) is the importance of being global and local at the same time. We cannot afford the luxury of ignoring free expression problems in our own backyard out of complacency, assuming that because we have a constitutional democracy, we can relax and focus our attention elsewhere. It is therefore unnecessary and, in fact, unpatriotic to develop the skeptical reflex, as this democracy was hard won, and to be skeptical about it, betrays the depth of the revolution that has happened. Freedom of expression groups in the US and Britain have tended to do this, focusing their attention on repressive governments in the South while failing to address the incremental erosion of this freedom in the North; now we down South have to deal with the consequences of their inaction, as Northern repression is exported to our countries under the guise of fighting the war against terror.
But a far more insidious threat to freedom of expression in our countries has come from the so-called Washington consensus policies, that drain our countries of resources to the benefit of the North, and when our citizens rise up in protest, they may be brutally put down. It is these very policies that define libraries as a drain on public resources, to be sacrificed in the interests of achieving a small state, rather than as an indispensable public good that should be supported irrespective of their ability to generate income. While residual respect for social democracy in the North has led to some level of protection for libraries, in the South, structural adjustment policies have devastated libraries. 

South Africa is an interesting case study when it comes to freedom of expression and access to information. On the one hand, it has attempted to realize a revolution against apartheid injustice; on the other it has become a crucial conveyer belt for Washington consensus policies. Its attempts to balance these contradictions are placing strain on its institutions of democracy. We should be concerned as South Africa, like the US, has the economic muscle to export its problems: in fact many on the continent sarcastically refer to South Africa as the George Bush of Africa. South Africa’s transition to democracy is often considered to be a miracle. It has a constitution that is the envy of many other countries: in fact, few countries can boast a dedicated constitutional guarantee of access to information, especially in relation to information held by the private sector. Often, if the right of access to information is recognized, it is buried away in a sub-clause in the general right to freedom of expression, is generally phrased as a passive right, and does not recognize the right to privately held information. In these respects, the South African legislative structure around access to information is highly progressive. 

Yet, South Africa’s transition to democracy had its own contradictions. Negotiations ensued in conditions that were disadvantageous to the liberation movement. The collapse of the Soviet Union put an end to a bipolar world, and also put an end to a number of armed struggles, leading to a wave of negotiated settlements. The balance of forces at the time of negotiations led to a settlement that delivered many of the formal institutions of democracy, while leaving economic relations largely intact. Many have argued that it was the best possible settlement that could be hoped for under the circumstances. But it has meant that that we are living a contradiction. We have one of the most advanced democracies in the world existing cheek by jowl with one of the highest rates of inequality in the world. 

In the wake of the uprisings of 2004, and the even more recent service delivery uprisings this year, I find myself asking deeply uncomfortable questions. I often ask myself whether the negotiated settlement averted violence, or whether it deferred it to a later date. With an estimated 16 service delivery protests a day in 2004 alone, and with some councillors being attacked and hounded out of their homes by the very communities that brought them to office, and even murdered, I ask myself whether we are not replacing a race war with a class war. In the negotiations that led to our miracle transition, did we not sow the wind, and are we are now beginning to reap the whirlwind?

Given this context, it is not surprising that when freedom of expression is used to express pent up frustration with the slow pace of delivery, to pose unanswerable questions, the anger may be ignored, or worse blamed on a third force and suppressed. Of the 6000 or so service delivery protests that took place in 2004, approximately 1000 were considered by the Department of Safety and Security to be illegal. From our experience, we know of a tendency by local authorities to ban gatherings, even though their own actions in doing so are illegal. This tendency to suppress may be a reflex action on the part of those who occupy positions of authority, precisely because the questions are unanswerable and therefore frightening. Those who attempt to answer these questions from within - however indirectly - may be rooted out, for demonstrating an inability to function within a collective, defaming their leaders or bringing their institutions into disrepute. In other words they failed to deny the legitimacy of the questions being asked; they failed to maintain the veneer of normality.

Small wonder that South Africa has been moving towards what Roger Southall has called ‘low intensity democracy’ for some time now. This shift has manifested itself in small but telling ways in the freedom of information sector. The drafting of South Africa’s much celebrated Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA) dragged on for six years. Originally called the Open Democracy Bill, the broader notion of 'open democracy' was narrowed down to 'access to records'. Aspects of 'open democracy' that the government argued could be catered for under separate pieces of legislation were excised, such as whistleblower protection, protection of privacy and open meetings. These changes represented a fundamental shift in thinking when it came to open democracy towards providing the bare minimum required in order to give effect to the Constitutional right. In spite of the fact that whistleblower legislation has been passed in the form of the Protected Disclosures Act, laws covering the other areas are still pending. The resulting Act was promulgated in 2000. 

The excising of the open meetings provisions was especially worrying given the fact that there seems to be no moves on the part of the government to promulgate this legislation. The most restrictive aspects of PAIA - such as the blanket exemption of cabinet records and the overly broad grounds for refusal of records - were added at a time when the Bill disappeared into the machinery of the government, out of the view of civil society organisations. In addition, the government ditched the idea of setting up a dedicated enforcement mechanism in the form of Information Courts and the Open Democracy Commission (its tasks were given to the South African Human Rights Commission, or SAHRC). This means that, if you want to enforce your right of access to information, you have to go to court: a daunting and exceedingly expensive exercise.
In response to these developments - the most significant of which took place between 1996 and 1998 - Justine White wrote in 1998 that the resulting legislation was more palatable to the government than the previous 'open democracy' version from 1996. She noted '…The passage of the Bill, even in its current form, will nonetheless be a victory of sorts: South Africa will benefit from having freedom of information, privacy and whistleblower protection legislation. Nevertheless, the current draft of the Bill is clearly a watered-down version, apologetic and limping version of what was proposed before. In far too many places it compromises on issues of principle allowing government to avoid putting into practice its supposed commitment to participatory government and development'.[5] She concluded that it was inevitable that the government would become more hostile to open democracy legislation the longer it governed, and that the original champions of the Bill should take up the cudgels to restore its original vision.

Yet, government has been extremely prompt in enforcing laws that may potentially interfere with the right to privacy, though, such as the Regulation of Interception of Communications Act (Rica). Some of the key checks and balances to ensure that privacy is not violated unduly are simply not there. It is hard not to arrive at the conclusion that the government is responding to pressure from the US's anti-terrorism drive to fast-track the Act's implementation, in spite of the fact that mechanisms to prevent abuse of the Act are insufficient.

The key check is privacy legislation, which should codify the manner in which privacy is protected in the context of a surveillance regime. Recently, there have been signs that the Privacy Bill may be finalised, after having waited for over a decade. The Bill was developed as far back as 2002 by the Law Commission, and it was only four years later (in 2006) that things began to move along more rapidly. Contrast this with the short period of eighteen months of consultation with stakeholders over Rica. It is disturbing that an Act that potentially violates the right to privacy is being implemented in the absence of the Privacy Act.

With respect to the content of Rica, there are provisions that are problematic for privacy and, by extension, freedom of expression. Applications for interception orders are made to a judge, who is required only to be 'satisfied' that, 'there are reasonable grounds to believe', before authorising surveillance. Many other democratic countries require a much higher standard for orders to be granted; generally, the agency concerned needs to demonstrate 'probable' cause or a similar level of finding. The law should also require the order to state one of the crimes that has been committed, that necessitates electronic surveillance. Also, there should be a guarantee that the disruption to communications would be minimised and confined only to the target of the interception order.

More specifically, the implementation of Rica has been prioritised, and has been given a large budget, yet the implementation of laws that could be used to promote information access and the protection of privacy have been deprioritised and starved of resources. PAIA has lacked a budget for implementation for some time now, which has hampered its implementation to the point where the former Minister of Education Kader Asmal recently described its implementation as 'a joke'.
What has the effect been of promulgating a limping access to information law, starved of resources for implementation (Rica has reportedly been given a huge budget for implementation)? According to a 2004 study of 14 countries by the Open Society Justice Initiative (OSJI), a shocking 63 percent of requests for information filed in terms of PAIA met with mute refusals: a polite way of saying that they were ignored. This was much higher than the survey average of 47 percent of mute refusals. Only in 13 percent of cases was information received, compared to an average of 25 percent of cases in the other countries surveyed.[6] The failure to take information requests seriously is hardly surprising, as there is no quick and easy enforcement mechanism, which breeds a culture of impunity. Journalists find it extremely difficult to use PAIA, as it does not have a provision for expedited requests; this propels them to use leaks and confidential sources, which in itself is a risky activity given that journalistic sources do not have specific protection in law. Library and information worker could consider joining attempts to have PAIA changed to establish an information ombudsman, which may well be the same office as the privacy ombudsman. A proper implementation budget must also be lobbied for.

Other legislative changes should be of concern the librarians and information workers. Proposed amendments to the Film and Publications Act of 1996 have serious implications for the publishing industry, although most of the controversy had focussed on the implications for the media. Recently, it was announced to great fanfare, that the Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs had conceded the fact that the media would not be required to submit controversial material to the Film and Publications Board, hence opening them up to pre-publication censorship. In terms of the Bill, any person who intends to distribute a publication that contains visual presentations, descriptions or representations of sexual conduct, propaganda for war, incitement to imminent violence or hate speech, will have to submit the publication for classification.

However, non-media creators of publications, such as artists, writers and academics, will still be subject to the same sort of pre-publication censorship that the media fought so hard to avoid. It also means that librarians will not be able to control their own acquisions policy when it comes to controversial material; the Film and Publications Board – a government agency – will.

It is entirely inappropriate for a government institution like the Film and Publications Board to be the arbiter of what can and cannot be read or viewed, and hence what libraries can acquire, and under what conditions. Even if the Board decides to grant such publications an exemption on literary or artistic grounds, it is dangerous to hand the power to decide whether to allow publications or not over to the government, as it opens the door to government censorship of controversial speech.

In retaining this classification requirement for publications, the Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs has failed to address the crucial distinction between films and publications recognized in the Film and Publications Act of 1996. In terms of the Act, films are subject to tighter regulation than publications, as the former are considered to be more pervasive than the latter. Works of art are considered to be publications, and were therefore subject to lighter regulation. Publications were classified only if someone complained about them. The Bill changes this arrangement. Now publishers will be required to submit potentially controversial material before distribution, and will be guilty of a criminal offence if they do not. This is untenable. It will lead to great uncertainty amongst publishers and artists about whether they are required to submit their work or not, which may well lead to self-censorship. The Bill will be debated again in the third session of Parliament, in the National Council of Provinces, and library and information workers may want to consider participating in the public hearings.

But information access is being frustrated in other, more dramatic, ways, and these ways are much more difficult to check as they need to be fought on a case by case basis. Many individuals - frustrated with the fact that information about problems in particular institutions is not getting out – are speaking out, and facing the wrath of people in positions of authority. 

In doing so, they may well be motivated by a moral obligation to serve the public’s right to know, and may also be driven by a very profound notion of public service. Granted, some may be motivated by maliciousness, and may leak false information. But their motives will be tested by subjecting their claims to debate, not suppressing debate. Also, one needs to distinguish between false statements made in good faith, and deliberate misrepresentation of facts; all too often, people who speak to the media and get things wrong are held strictly liable for what they say. 

According to the Public Service Regulations of 2001, public servants have a duty to recognise the public’s right of access to information and to act at all times in the public interest.[7] Yet those who take this duty too seriously can find themselves on the wrong side of authority. Nowhere is this sickness more evident than in the public service. 

We are also seeing a growing tendency for public and private institutions to respond by disciplining such people, on the basis that they are damaging the reputation of their institutions, or they are defaming managers of these institutions. These problems cut across a range of sectors, from health to local government to the banking and the retail sectors. In fact, the suppression of dissent wherever it occurs seems to be a growing South African sickness.

People who are considered to be individualists, mavericks, or dissidents, are seen as nuisances; their change agency value recedes into the background as a consideration. The most public recent example involves the former Deputy Minister of Health Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge, who was fired partly for her ‘inability to function in a collective’, which in the circumstances seemed to be code for ‘you committed the sin of criticizing the government in public’ by calling the Frere hospital baby deaths a ‘national emergency’. This is in spite of the fact that, on some crucial issues of health policy, the government line has left much to be desired. This is also in spite of the fact that Madlala-Routledge is widely considered to be the person who managed to mend the fences between government and civil society, and in this respect demonstrated considerable ability to function as part of a collective. The events surrounding Madlala-Routledge’s dismissal reminds one of the Bertolt Brecht poem, entitled ‘The Solution’, and which goes as follows:

‘After the uprising of the 17th June
The Secretary of the Writers’ Union
Had leaflets distributed in the Stalinallee
Stating that the people
Had forfeited the confidence of the government
And could win it back only
By redoubled efforts.
Would it not be easier
In that case for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?’

The firing of Madlala-Routledge may be the most public example of intolerance of dissent, but there are other examples. In many of our public and private institutions, we hear the dull drone of disciplinary proceedings against people who are accused of defamation or bringing their institutions into disrepute, for attempting to provide information about issues of public interest. This is in spite of the fact that, in 1999, the Constitutional Court found that employees have a right to engage in speech that it critical of their employer. What also seems to have been forgotten is the fact that in 2006, the well-known doctor Costa Gazi was reinstated after being dismissed by the Ministry of Public Service and Administration, for criticizing the government's HIV/ Aids policy in the media. The Pretoria High Court found that his criticisms did not prejudice the administration of the department, and ordered his reinstatement. 

Yet in spite of these positive precedents, we have been told by doctors in the Western Cape public health system that they have been warned that speaking to the media even in their individual capacities could lead to disciplinary action. A health reporter in a daily newspaper told us that they had begun to accept as normal the fact that people in the public health system would not speak to them, under any circumstances. Many speak about a climate of fear in the public service.

In the wake of the suspension of Eastern Cape doctor Dr. Nokuzola Nthsona, for publicly supporting Madlala-Routledge’s statements on Frere hospital, another doctor has been suspended for exposing problems in the public health system. In a textbook example of killing a fly with a hammer, Dr. Paul Theron is being brought before a disciplinary hearing for alerting the inspecting judge and Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Correctional Services to the reportedly ailing state of medical facilities at Pollsmoor prison, where he is a clinical forensic practitioner. He is also being sued by the Minister of Correctional Services, Ngconde Balfour, who is claiming R500 000 in damages for allegedly defamatory statements by Dr. Theron. 

The lawsuit stems from a letter Theron wrote to the area manager of Pollsmoor prison, protesting against the suspension of the Head of the medical facilities at the prison, and criticising the Department of Correctional Services. According to medical reports, Theron has attempted to draw the attention of the authorities to what he claims are inadequate medical facilities at the prison, with little success, for several years. He is now accused of failing to follow proper channels in raising his complaints. 

The Batho Pele principles of access to information, openness and transparency and redress in the public service, are proving to be an annoying inconvenience in other public institutions as well. In February 2007, the Metsimaholo municipality instituted disciplinary proceedings against municipal employee and Cosatu chairperson for the Free State, Patrick Seshea, for exposing alleged corruption in the Municipality, and speaking to the media about the municipality’s affairs.  At issue was a letter that he wrote to the Special Investigating Unit about the alleged corruption. Copies were sent to the MEC for Local Government, President Thabo Mbeki, the Minister for Local Government and the office of the Municipal Manager. In the Vaal Weekly, Seshea complained that he was suspended for being a whistleblower of corruption that was happening in the Municipality, and that he was being punished for sending the report to the MEC for Local Government Affairs.[8] He was charged, with amongst other things, criticising his employer in the media, and was dismissed in May 2007. 

The disciplinary proceedings were instituted in terms of a Municipal Manager’s instruction, issued in November 2002, and ordering employees to refrain from communicating with the media about the Municipality’s affairs. This instruction does not seem to be reasonable and justifiable, and in any event, if the Municipality intended to protect confidential information, then there were less restrictive means to achieve the same ends than banning all contact with the media. 

There seems to be a growing attitude that when you sign an employment contract, you sign away your rights, as though the employment relationship sanctions mind control.

The problem has even gone right up to the highest office in South Africa. Thoko Mkhwanazi-Xaluva is a former director in the Office of the Rights of the Child (ORC), based in the presidency and reporting to Minister Essop Pahad. In June 2003, Mkhwanazi-Xaluva was dismissed by the Presidency for, she claims, having blown the whistle on sexual harassment by a consultant to the ORC who, she says, was a friend of Pahad. 

The matter was referred to the General Public Service Sectoral Bargaining Council, which reinstated her in November 2003. She was dismissed again for interviews she had given to the media regarding her initial dismissal. Once again, the matter went to the General Public Service Sectoral Bargaining Council in February 2006. Mkhwanazi-Xaluva won the case in the Bargaining Council. The Presidency has since appealed to the Labour Court, and Pahad has argued in papers that her statements about him are defamatory, and that she should be disallowed from working for the state ever again.[9]

Even the one institution that you would expect to uphold the principle of freedom of expression, the public broadcaster, the South African Broadcasting Corporation, has been responsible for some of the most breathtaking attacks on this right in recent history. 

Yet the censorship bug is not isolated to the public service only. On August 15, a senior member of the South African cricket squad, Mark Boucher, gave an interview to Business Day newspaper, criticising Cricket SA’s decision to omit Jaques Kallis from the Twenty20 squad, to represent South Africa in the coming world championship in South Africa. 

In the interview, he stated that ‘It is either those who have an issue with him, and have a chip on their shoulders, or those who have ulterior motives’.[10]  Cricket SA then instituted disciplinary proceedings against him for criticising an organisational decision. The following parts of the code are at issue:

1.5 Participants shall not engage in –
1.5.2 Unbecoming or detrimental conduct which could bring them, the Board or the game of cricket into disrepute.
1.6 Participants shall not disclose or comment publicly or make any public pronouncement or media comment –
1.6.1 Which is detrimental to the game of cricket in general; or
1.6.2 Which is detrimental to a particular tournament or match in which they are involved; or
1.6.4 Which is critical of or detrimental to the selection of any team for any regulated match. 

The provisions in the disciplinary code about speaking to the media are laughably unconstitutional. It makes it impossible for players to differ publicly with decisions taken by Cricket SA. Such suppression of debate will be to the ultimate detriment of the sport. What is also disturbing about this incident is that Boucher did not make a direct attack on Cricket SA; yet they has still taken umbrage at his very generalised statements. Being a member of a sporting code does not mean that they own you, heart and soul.

Censorship is to be found in the private sector as well. The FXI had defended a worker from the Superspar store in Cape Town who was dismissed for writing an article critical of working conditions at the store. He was reinstated by the Commission on Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration. Apart from the Sibeko case mentioned above, there are other recent cases of free speech infringements in private sector institutions. For instance, Faizel Katkodia, an employee at Standard Bank, was called to a disciplinary hearing for sending out emails critical of the state of Israel to his private mailing list using the bank’s internet resources. He has been charged of using the bank’s internet resources in violation of bank policy of bringing the bank into disrepute. 

Universities too have become the latest flashpoint for freedom of expression problems, with a number of academics having been disciplined for defamation of managers or bringing their institutions into disrepute. All these incidents point to a growing disciplinary culture, where greater controls are placed on what people say.

Conclusion

To paraphrase President Thabo Mbeki, in South Africa today, the rights to freedom of expression and access to information are like a miniskirt: open to interpretation. Some managers in our public and private institutions have taken this to mean that they can be limited. Those of us who are in the knowledge sector cannot afford the luxury of complacency on these matters, as knowledge workers – whose stock in trade is the promotion of debate – are especially vulnerable to these problems.  Each and every case that involves the free speech of individuals, each and every law that impacts on free speech and freedom of information, need to be analysed and debated. Where such cases are genuine infringements on these freedoms, then the individuals concerned need to be supported. We need to make it impossible for someone to be targeted because they have spoken out. This is how we practice intellectual self-defence; it involves a measure of risk, and self-sacrifice. 

The self-preservation instinct is understandable and inevitable, because of the high levels of unemployment in the country; the overriding question may become, but where will I get a job again if I am fired for speaking out? We work on a daily basis with people who grapple with these question in our public institutions, so we have some sense of the dynamics. But we have also seen how just one person speaking out can turn an institution around. We are also aware that some of the people who we defend are not angels, but if we wait for the ‘perfect victim’ of censorship to come along to raise issues about the extent of the space to speak out, we risk waiting until it is too late.

The difficulty is that if all of us put self-preservation above free and independent thinking, will we continue to enjoy the spaces that we do have? What will become of the health reporter, who can see problems in the public health system, but who is unable to report because no-one will speak to her. More importantly, what happens to the people who have to use public health services, and who have to live the problems, in spite of official protestations that things are normal: for instance, the mothers whose babies died at Frere hospital?

We need to take the defence of free expression and freedom of information much more seriously in South Africa. It must become a discussion point of every library association. Libraries cannot be islands of freedom in a sea of censorship; if a narrow approach is adopted towards the defence of this freedom, then the broader pressures on this freedom will inevitably catch up with libraries. The Film and Publications Bill is a case in point. The media have done the countries no favours by fighting for their corner only, and not engaging in a broader fight for the freedom of everyone concerned with access to published material.

Libraries too, have particular freedom of information problems, and I will be the first to admit that in the free expression field, we have not done enough the address them. But there again, if our free thinkers are not protected, then we can be sure that our libraries will not be protected. Until recently, the treatment of our libraries has left much to be desired: a legacy of the years of fiscal austerity in the late 1990’s. In the last set of figures made publicly available, according a school register of needs survey, conducted in 2001, 80% of the 27000 schools in South Africa do not have libraries.[11] According to a needs assessment report by Africa Book Connection, a non-profit organization that sources textbooks for poor students, South African university libraries are underfunded, and face severe shortages of books, journals and other learning material. Their figures reveal stark disparities between Historically Advantaged Institutions and Historically Disadvantaged Institutions in access to books.[12]   In eThekwini, the responsibility for libraries is shunted between provincial and local government, with the municipality complaining that it has effectively become an unfunded mandate. 

What is welcome is the announcement of a R1 billion cash injection into the South African library system, and the promotion of publishing in indigenous languages, which should help to address the parlous state of some libraries. The short shrift that libraries have been getting is a symptom of the lack of seriousness with which intellectual engagement is taken. It is a welcome indication that the tide is now turning with respect to our libraries. But when will we start to value our free thinkers? 

Endnotes

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[1] Byrne, A. Opening address. Libraries for the future: progress, development and partnerships.  August 2007. Durban. 19-234.
[2] Noam Chomsky, quoted in Klaehn, J. (ed). 2005. Filtering the news: essays on Herman and Chomsky’s propaganda model. Montreal: Black Rose Books. 17.
[3] Noam Chomsky, quoted in Klaehn, J. (ed). 2005. Filtering the news: essays on Herman and Chomsky’s propaganda model…15.
[4] Fillmore, N. ‘Groups should do more to protect journalists’. Index on Censorship. Dowloaded from http://www.indexonline.org/en/news/articles/2007/2/world-press-freedom-day-2007-what-are0-the-re.html. 1.
[5]  Justine White article..
[6] Open Democracy Advice Centre. Annual Report 2005. 16-17. The following countries were surveyed: Argentina, Armenia, Bulgaria, Chile, France, Kenya, Ghana, Macedonia, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, Romania, South Africa and Spain. 
[7] Public Service Regulations, 2001. B-32.
[8] Gqozo, J. ‘Whistleblower “unfairly” suspended. Vaal Weekly. 17-23/05/2006.
[9] Mkhabela, M. 'Enemy of the State'. City Press. 9/12/2006.
[10] Smit, M. ‘Boucher goes to bat for discarded Kallis’. Business Day. 15/08/2007.
[11] DOE 2001. Report on school register of needs. 2000 survey. Pta.
[12] Keating, C. ‘SA varsities face book shortage’. Cape Argus. 24/07/2007.