whether the new-found extended public space will endure when the new ANC leadership takes over state power after the elections due next year. On the down side, defamation cases are increasing with Jacob Zuma taking the lead as complainant against a number of newspapers and Zapiro, a well respected cartoonist. While intimidation of journalists by provincial governments is decreasing, there are still incidents of media practitioners getting angry phone calls from officials. The situation is worse at local level where especially community media are from time to time threatened by ANC councillors. In many cases, allegations of corruption are not investigated for fear of reprisals. Generally, there seems to be a lack of tolerance of criticism amongst politicians. South African media publish a significant amount of advertising from the government, and there are cases where government officials have threatened to withdraw their custom from publications they regard as being excessively critical. Commercial interests tend to exert even more pressure: To a large extent commercial enterprises escape the critical attention of the mass media fearful of annoying the big advertising spenders. SCORES: Individual scores: Average score: 1.3 3, 4, 4, 2, 3, 4, 3, 3, 3 3.2 (2006 = 2.6) There are no laws restricting freedom of expression such as excessive official secret or libel acts, or laws that unreasonably interfere with the responsibilities of media. ANALYSIS: Section 205 of the Criminal Procedures Act, which compels journalists to reveal their sources of confidential information, remains one of the biggest problems. Although in a “record of understanding” media and government representatives agreed in 1999 that such disclosure would not be enforced as a matter of course but only as a last resort, the uncertainty about this section remains. Defamation is largely a civil rather than criminal matter in South Africa, with the legal provisions designed to protect a person’s reputation. Claims are usually used post publication to sue the newspaper for damages or retractions, but have also been cited in applications to interdict a newspaper from publishing. Increasingly during recent years, individuals and organisations have lodged urgent interdicts in a bid to stop newspapers from publishing information. The Mail & Guardian weekly seems to have borne the brunt of such attempts: between May 2006 and July 2007 six interdicts were lodged against the paper in the Johannesburg High Court. While only two of them were temporarily successful, the constant threat of interdicts and high litigation costs makes it increasingly risky to embark on investigative reporting. A landmark judgement by the Supreme Court of Appeal in May 2007, however, will hopefully limit the granting by the lower courts of last minute interdicts to stop newspaper publication. As things stand there is some danger that South Africa might be turning into a litigation society, a situation which would limit the immediate enjoyment of constitutionally guaranteed rights. Another point of concern is the Film and Publications Amendment Bill 2006 which seeks to So This Is Democracy? 2008 -200- Media Institute of Southern Africa