State of the media in Southern Africa - 2003 Problems of access were a controversial issue during the visit of US president George Bush in July, prompting complaints to both the US Embassy and the SA Department of Foreign Affairs about the exclusion of South African journalists from parts of Bush’s itinerary. The Media Development and Diversity Agency, legislated into existence in 2002, appointed a Chief Executive Officer and also published its funding guidelines for comment. Its activities are expected to commence in earnest in 2004. Meanwhile, a range of new commercial print titles, largely tabloid in tone, continued to grow and flourish. However, content diversity as regards gender and racial representation was shown to be extremely problematic in a study by Genderlinks, MISA and the Media Monitoring Project. The results revealed that only 19 percent of news sources were women, and even worse, that black women (who constitute 45 percent of the population) made up only 7 percent of the total. Black men made up 27 percent of news sources, and white men 32 percent. On the other hand, SABC began afternoon television news in Tshivenda and Xitsonga, two of the country’s most marginalised indigenous languages, but closed down loss-making Bop Broadcasting TV and radio stations. Meanwhile, slow steps began towards SABC implementing legislation that requires it to set up two new TV channels to carry only African languages. Regulator ICASA called for comment on possible amendments to the pro-diversity legal requirement that restricts cross-ownership to 20% shareholdings between print and broadcast operations. The result is likely to be a more lenient approach by the regulator, and possibly even legislative change. The movement by ICASA came in the aftermath of New Africa Investments Ltd (NAIL) being refused permission by the regulator to acquire Kagiso Media’s radio stations. The effect was for NAIL to throw in the towel as a media player, and put its own assets up for sale. The regulator stands to benefit from the Convergence Bill released in December that proposes a new funding formula that would substantially strengthen ICASA’s ability to hire skilled staff and to function expeditiously. However, there are concerns that its provisions to licence content services and applications could be interpreted to include web-site publishers and not just broadcasters. Internal issues within the media during 2003 included fears raised that the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) was seeking to centralise editorial control through a proposed new “upward referral” system that would render the CEO as the Editor-in-Chief, thereby merging business and editorial responsibilities in one post. This was criticised for threatening to inhibit independence and initiative at the reporter level and for facilitating easier political control from on high. In response, SABC argued that its journalists had to be accountable, and that the Broadcast Act, the SABC’s licence and its internal draft code of conduct guaranteed the independence of editorial both from political and commercial interests. The “upward referral” system was part of a wider set of editorial policies put forward for public comment by the SABC, after MPs last year overruled draft legislation that the Minister of Communications should determine SABC policies. Later, a mini-furore erupted in regard to how SABC was responding to controversy about politicians appearing in its programmes in the run-up to the 2004 elections. Some commentators identified a “gagging” attempt in a secretive memorandum that party political discussions So This Is Democracy? 2003 73 Media Institute of Southern Africa