It is coming at a crucial time as it focuses on communication as a tool for solidarity. At the conclusion of this conference, we must be able to answer what the best strategy is to achieve solidarity and how we can go about implementing it. For this panel, I will be focusing on media and class struggle in South Africa. The purpose of my presentation is to discuss the challenges we face as an organization in attempting to expand the voices of the working class. This is an issue that is quite close to my heart. Before working at NUMSA (National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa), I was a journalist for ten years, working at several well-known corporate media organizations in South Africa, including Eyewitness News (EWN).
I recall my first day on the job at EWN when my editor asked me what I thought my role as a journalist was. My enthusiastic response was, "to defend the defenseless, to be a voice for the voiceless." She looked at me and said, "No, that's not your job. Your job is to get content for the benefit of advertisers." I must say that for her to be so explicit about the true function of the media — that it operates to defend and advance the interests of advertisers and corporations — was a real eye-opening experience for me. What she said largely defines the attitude of media in South Africa. South African media is extremely corporate and neoliberal; it unashamedly advances the interests of Western imperialism. This is consistent across the board, whether you are looking at public corporations, such as the SABC (South African Broadcasting Corporation), or other media outlets. When you come to South Africa, you can tune into any radio station or TV channel and what you will hear is a narrative that advances imperialism, neocapitalism, and neocolonialism, with a particular anti-working-class, anti-Black, and hostile stance towards any kind of alternative view.
This issue was highlighted in 2012 when mine workers in the northwest of South Africa, in an area called Marikana, embarked on a lengthy unprotected strike. I will provide some details. Marikana is a very poor place where Lonmin Mines, a major platinum provider, is based. In August 2012, the strike ended with 34 of the workers being shot live on television by a member of the South African Police Service (SAPS). The Marikana Massacre has come to define what South Africa is today: a country that was liberated by the ANC (African National Congress), but now actively oppresses the working class. What is ironic about what happened in Marikana is that the police's decision to shoot at unarmed workers was triggered by an email sent by Cyril Ramaphosa, who is our president today. Cyril Ramaphosa was on the board of Lonmin and wrote an email to members of the security cluster, who responded with heavy-handedness to the unarmed workers. The narrative that emerged from the media about the Marikana Massacre was one that blamed the workers for the protest, positioning them as violent savages who were, in the view of the media, responsible for their own massacre.
The South African media never views capitalism as violent. I was a practicing journalist at the time and spent a lot of time in Marikana. The violence of capitalism is expressed there. The entire area is undeveloped, lacking sanitation, decent housing, and electricity, and yet one of the biggest platinum firms extracts its wealth from that area and gives nothing back to the community. That is what the workers at Marikana were ultimately fighting for — a better life. It is deeply ironic that a man like Ramaphosa, a former trade unionist who helped form the National Union of Mineworkers, was the very person who inspired the security forces to react with such violence. I would urge you to read an analysis done by Ilva Gomerday of the University of Johannesburg, where she researched how the reporting on Marikana was characterized by "embedded journalism, sensationalism, and polarization of views." She found that the media acted as a powerful loudspeaker for the interests of the South African political and socioeconomic nexus, neglecting the fundamental problems underlying labor relations in the country.
Another classic example of the hostility and intolerance the South African media has for alternative views is how they have covered the issue of the war in Ukraine. It is a completely one-sided narrative, with absolutely no tolerance for dissenting views. Almost all media platforms, especially the so-called independent ones, have described it as an invasion by Russia. They criticize the South African government for being neutral on this issue and will not tolerate any dissenting voices. The night before this speech, I was engaged in a debate on Twitter with one of these journalists who was so offended by my comment that South Africa should not get involved in this war and should instead advance its own national interests.
I also stated that this is not a neutral matter but is about NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) aggression. His response to me was, "It means that NUMSA supports the slaughtering of babies." This is the kind of mentality that characterizes the South African media discourse, where it is impossible to engage in a nuanced debate on issues. The dominant framework in South African media is defined by the West and by Bretton Woods institutions, which are advancing the continuation of imperialism in all of these newsrooms. At the same time, there is a real fear and hatred of communism, and the involvement of Russia has reawakened these issues, as during apartheid, communism was something the government was obsessed with.
I really enjoyed the input from Professor Vijay Prashad, who spoke about the suffocating nature of corporate media, which is a perfect description, because there is no space for alternative views. If you offer a different opinion, you will be labeled. In South Africa, there are 40 commercial and public broadcast stations. The largest media house by far is the SABC, with over 30 million viewers in the country. They remain the most popular news platform and also have many very popular radio stations. However, even though the SABC is a public broadcaster, its narrative has unfortunately been heavily influenced by these right-wing, so-called independent media houses. As a result, they also churn out the same propaganda that many of these other organizations do.
Given this context, how has NUMSA managed to operate in this space? Our strategy has been to unashamedly promote the working class and our message of Marxism-Leninism. We are able to get our message broadcast every day, whether the media likes it or not, because we recognize that power is not just in the media; it is in the 350,000 metalworkers who can shut down the economy when they go on strike. So, even if they cannot stand us, they cannot ignore us. Ultimately, whatever media strategy we build, we must ensure that we take the movements with us and that the working class is driving the agenda and the message, because that is where the real power lies.
Part of the work we have been doing to advance this agenda is the training we offer at the school in Bela-Bela. This work is key to tackling the suffocating narrative we see in the media. Dr. M'membe was absolutely right when he said that you cannot rely on imperialists to drive your message; we must build our own platforms. That is exactly what the Bela-Bela school is doing. This year, the school was held in Ghana, which was a very interesting experience. We get students from all over the continent and also from Brazil and other places where we have relationships. We take them through media training, and in that process, we learn a lot about the conditions facing the working class in those different parts of the world. We have also established partnerships with organizations like Peoples Dispatch and have been working very closely with PAT TV. We have also done some work with teleSUR in the past and hope to build on that collaboration at this conference.
I believe the key to our ability to defeat the crisis we are facing is to continue this work, to actually build these platforms, and to create this alternative for the majority of people. We are the majority; we should be the ones to dominate the narrative and should not be spending our time begging for airtime from right-wingers. Ultimately, that is what we should be striving for. I am grateful that we have the opportunity to do this and find solutions. I look forward to hearing from some of you about other ways we can deepen this interaction. When we leave this conference, we must strengthen these networks so that as we move into the future, it is the voice of the majority that dominates our media discourse and not the voice of the elite minority responsible for our suffering.
(Transcribed from recording and edited.)