SABC 8 press on with ConCourt battle

13 September 2016

Johannesburg - The eight SABC journalists fired and later reinstated for their opposition to the broadcaster’s policy to censor coverage of protests, will continue with their Constitutional Court application.

Their lawyers, Norton Rose Fulbright, said in a statement on Monday that the application was intended to oppose “unlawful conduct” at the public broadcaster.

“While seven of the SABC 8 have been reinstated and while the SABC has purported to accept that the protest policy is unlawful, the SABC 8 are of the view that the unlawful conduct at the SABC continues.”

In supplementary affidavits, they said the SABC and the Communications Minister Faith Muthambi continued to defend the protest policy.

“The culture of censorship at the SABC continues, the culture of fear in the newsroom persists,” they said.

They offered to make a presentation about issues at the SABC to Parliament’s communications portfolio committee. The committee however met without giving them the chance to do so.

According to the attorneys, the committee refused to conduct a proper investigation into the SABC. The eight wanted the Constitutional Court to declare that the National Assembly and the committee breached their constitutional obligations.

They wanted the court to hand down an order instructing the National Assembly to institute an inquiry into the issues they had raised.

This article first appeared on News24, see here.