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The Case of the Schabir Shaik Trial Patience Thembeka

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Conformity in the selected print media content as a threat to democracy: The case of the Schabir Shaik trial Patience Thembeka Ntuli June 2010 Prof Nixon Kariithi (Supervisor) A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfilment of the Degree of Master of Arts in Journalism and Media Studies . i DECLARATION I declare that this research report submitted for the degree of Master of Arts in Journalism and Media Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg is my own original work and has not been submitted to any other institution of higher education or for any examination in any form. I further declare that all sources cited or quoted are indicated and acknowledged by means of a comprehensive list of references. ………………………….. ……………………………. Patience Thembeka Ntuli Date Copyright University of the Witwatersrand 2010 . ii ACKOWLEDGEMENTS To my God, thank you, Lord, for always keeping your promise of “never leaving nor forsaking me” throughout the time of writing this thesis. Lord, this is once again the living testimony that you are God. Thank you for allowing me to continue to enjoy your blessings, everlasting love and protection. I wish to extend my heartfelt gratitude to my supervisor, Prof Nixon Kariithi, for his continued support and encouragement throughout this challenging period and for ensuring that I complete this project. Prof, without your expertise and experience, this project would never have seen the light. I am indebted to my employer, College of Human Sciences UNISA, for all the study leave, financial support and encouragement. Special thanks must go to Professor Mokgethi Motlhabi; Professor Rosemary Moeketsi; Professor Kuzvinetsa Dzvimbo; Professor Greg Curbertson and Professor Oupa Mashile. I am particularly grateful to Professor de Kock and Dr Barry Hanyane for providing constructive criticism of my work. This dissertation would also not have been possible without the following people: my librarian at Unisa, Dawie Malan without whose support I would never have been able to juggle around the database; Marlette van der Merwe for the initial edit and Lyn Voigt for the final edit. I acknowledge the prayers and support of all family members, mentors and friends. Thank you for allowing me to spend most of my time with my books. May God bless and protect all of you. Mama, it is at times like these that I miss you the most. Your teachings, especially the one about the importance of education continue to carry me. I wish you were here to “brag about me”! I miss you but I find joy in knowing that you love me and would have been very proud of me. iii Dedication. To the lovely blessing from God, my daughter Sphesihle Chuleza Nomahlwani Mpapama, who was born a week after I had received the news about passing the MA. iv UNIVERSITY OF WITWATERSRAND, JOHANNESBURG ABSTRACT By Thembeka Ntuli It generally appears that headlines, story content, photographs and sources in different South African newspapers are often the same. This conformity poses a major threat to democracy as diversity in all facets of the media is important in order to help the public make informed choices. Using the case of the Schabir Shaik trial, the study investigated the extent of conformity in the news output of selected newspapers: The Citizen, The Star, Sowetan and Natal Witness from January 2001 to June 2005. Only selected front page stories and editorials of the newspapers were studied. Thematic content analysis, quantitative and qualitative methods were used to explore the subject. The study was predominantly informed by theories of news production which posit that news is not the actual truth; it is in fact a selective representation of the world. The notion of objectivity was extensively debated and it was observed that complete “objectivity” as an ideal is unattainable especially when one considers that news-making processes are complex and influenced by a number of diverse factors. The study also argues that sources play an important role in shaping news content because they set parameters and define terms of reference. It emerged in the results that the sharing of news and reliance on similar sources across publications breed homogeneity; that most news is covered in an episodic/dramatic fashion for the purpose of profit and that objectivity is frequently not practised in newspaper editorials. The study concludes that media should promote diversity in all facets and strive for balance when covering stories. v “They look like newspapers; they feel like newspapers; they even leave ink on your finger tip. But they are not really newspapers” (Guy Berger, Sunday Times, 1 May 2005, p.3) . vi TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE DECLARATION (ii) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS (iii) DEDICATION (iv) ABSTRACT (v) CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1 1.0 INTRODUCTION 1 1.1 Chapter Outline 1 1.2 Historical Background of the Schabir Shaik Trial 3 1.3 Research Questions 5 CHAPTER 2 MEDIA AND DEMOCRACY 6 2.0 INTRODUCTION 6 2.1 Defining the Concept of Democracy 6 2.2 The Role of the Media in a Democracy 8 2.3 The Concept of Public Sphere 13 2.3.1 Criticism of the Habermasian theory 15 2.4 African Media and Democracy as they relate to the Public Sphere. 19 2.5 Conclusion 23 CHAPTER 3 NEWS PRODUCTION AS A SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF REALITY 24 3.0 INTRODUCTION 24 3.1 Sociology of News Production 24 . vii 3.1.1 News framing and values 27 3.2 Socialisation of Media Workers 34 3.3 Reliance on Sources 37 3.4 Objectivity in the Media 38 3.4.1 The issue of balance 40 3. 5 Gatekeeping Theory 41 3.6 Media Ownership 42 3.7 Influence of Advertisers on Content 44 3.8 Commercialisation 46 3.8.1 Market driven journalism 47 3.8.2 Tabloid journalism 50 3.9 Conclusion 50 CHAPTER 4 THE SOUTH AFRICAN PRESS IN CONTEXT 51 4.0 INTRODUCTION 51 4.1 History of South Africa Press 53 4.1.1 English press 57 4.1.2 Afrikaans press 57 4.1.3 The Black press 59 4.1.4 The Protest press/Alternative press 60 4.2 Newspaper Firms in South Africa 62 4.2.1 Naspers 63 4.2.2 Independent News and Media 63 4.2.3 Avusa Limited 65 4.2.4 CTP/Caxton Publishers and Printers LTD 66 4.2.5 M&G Media 66 4.3 Challenges Faced by South African Media, and Developments 67 4.4 Media State Relationship after Apartheid 69 4.5 Conclusions 71 . viii CHAPTER 5 METHODOLOGY 72 5.0 INTRODUCTION 72 5.1 Methodology 72 5.2 Thematic Analysis 76 5.3 Discourse Analysis 77 5.4 Time Frame 79 5.5 Selection of Articles 79 5.6 Data Collection 80 5.7 Conclusion 81 CHAPTER 6 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 82 6.0 INTRODUCTION 82 6.1 Data Collection and Data Analysis 84 6.1.1 Analysis of editorials 87 6.1.2 Analysis of front page articles 94 6.1.3 Analysis of sources used in the front page articles 100 6.1.4 Analysis of metaphors 103 6.1.5 Analysis of news values/frames 106 6.2 Conclusions 107 CHAPTER 7 CONCLUSION 109 7.0 INTRODUCTION 109 7.1 Conclusions on Literature Review 109 7.2 Conclusion on Methodology 113 7.3 Conclusions on Findings 114 7.4 Limitations of the Study 117 7.5 On Further Research 118 . ix LIST OF TABLES 3.1 Values in news 30 4.1 Independent Newspapers 64 5.1 Readership profile of the four newspapers studied 78 6.2 Overall coverage of the Schabir Shaik trial by the four newspapers studied 87 BIBLIOGRAPHY 120 APPENDICES 134 . x CHAPTER 1 CONFORMITY IN THE SELECTED PRINT MEDIA CONTENT AS A THREAT TO DEMOCRACY: THE CASE OF THE SCHABIR SHAIK TRIAL1 1.0 Introduction With the end of apartheid after 1990, the new South African Interim Constitution explicitly guaranteed press freedom with the view that this would encourage diversity of ownership and therefore diversity of opinion. Over the past few years the researcher has observed incidents in which different South African newspapers have come up with headlines, story contents, and photographs and used sources that are strikingly similar2. Schabir Shaik trial has been chosen because of the following reasons: it is arguably South Africa’s biggest post-apartheid corruption trial. The Schabir Shaik trial was the subject of intense media attention owing to the involvement of several high profile members of the South African government. The number of newspapers referred to it as a biggest court case in a democracy. It has had an influence in the sucking in of the deputy president, Jacob Zuma and is having a negative impact on his (Jacob Zuma's) political career and lastly the very same trial has also led to the biggest division within the African National Congress in its 95-year history. It is therefore interesting for the researcher to use it as the case study for this project. The Schabir Shaik trial was punted to be the trial of the decade. The Star, 06 Oct 2004:12, editorial. And was labelled the same by Natal Witness (02 June 2005:1). South African media often comes out with close, sometimes even identical headlines, and uses the same pictures for stories especially in major news stories. For example, when the South African swimming team won Gold, the same picture was used in all four of the following newspapers: The Star, Sowetan, The Citizen, and Business Day. Also, when . 1 Jacob Zuma was cleared of rape charges on the 9 May 2006, three newspapers had strikingly similar headings and pictures.
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