SECTOR 1 1.12 Media legislation evolves from meaningful consultations among state institutions, citizens and interest groups. Although public consultation in the preparation of new legislation is prescribed by law, such consultation has been haphazard and in many cases not meaningful. Parliament regularly places advertisements in newspapers inviting comments and/ or participation in public hearings on certain bills (“Have Your Say”) but there seems to be a selective process as to which announcements make it into the media. There is no coordinated effort to publicise this information on a consistent basis and the Public Participation Unit of parliament seems to be dormant. Media practitioners generally do not rely on information from parliament when it comes to agendas for meetings and documents, but rather on the non-governmental Parliamentary Monitoring Group. The Public Service Broadcasting Bill is a case in point. In mid-2009 the Department of Communications distributed a list of 67 questions to selected organisations and individuals asking them to give their thoughts on various issues regarding broadcasting – allowing them only a month to respond. At the end of October, the department presented a Draft Bill which did not reflect most of the responses received to the questionnaire. The public was given five weeks to comment, a deadline which was extended after pressure from lobby groups to early January 2010 - when most people are still on their main annual holiday breaks. The bill was still in the works at the department by early August 2010. The time lapsed since mid-2009 could have been used for meaningful and structured consultations (“a White Paper Process”), as suggested all along by media groups, and a proper policy framework based on research could have been drawn up over that period. Another example is the public hearings held by an ad hoc committee of Parliament in July 2010 on the highly controversial Protection of Information Bill. Committee members seemed ill-informed or biased in favour of the bill in their line of questioning, and a number of senior members did not even attend the hearings, prompting civil society groups to write a letter to the Speaker of Parliament demanding a proper process, and to launch a vigorous public campaign outside of the confines of parliament. AFRICAN MEDIA BAROMETER SOUTH AFRICA 2010 23