'Spy' journo subpoenaed

2003-10-08 21:23

Johannesburg - Media organisations objected on Wednesday to a reporter being compelled to give evidence to the Hefer Commission investigating spy allegations against National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka.

The reporter - on whom a subpoena has been served - is former Sunday Times political correspondent Ranjeni Munusamy.

The South African National Editors' Forum, the Freedom of Expression Institute and the South African chapter of the Media Institute of Southern Africa, said in a joint statement they were "totally opposed to journalists being questioned about their confidential sources of information".

Munusamy wrote a story published in City Press newspaper which claimed the ANC had investigated Ngcuka as possible spy for the apartheid government.

The Hefer Commission has been set up by President Thabo Mbeki to investigate whether Ngcuka was indeed a spy.

Munusamy 'will not give evidence'

Munusamy had stated she would not give evidence before the commission, the media organisations said, adding: "The three organisations strongly support Munusamy in her refusal not only because testimony by her would place the identities of her confidential sources at risk, but because it endangers a cardinal constitutional principle protecting freedom of the media.

"As public interest lobby groups, the three organisations strongly believe that freedom of expression, media freedom and access to information are critical in ensuring the free flow of information and ideas and in encouraging public participation, transparency and accountability of government and other institutions of society.

"The organisations point out that compulsion on a journalist to testify, provide information, hand over material or reveal his or her confidential sources of information violates the constitutional right to freedom of expression and freedom of the media, coupled with the freedom to receive or impart information and ideas. It has the attendant consequence of infringing the public's constitutional right to be informed."

By compelling journalists to testify, "confidential sources of information inevitably dry up as people lose trust in the media's promises of confidentiality and come to fear that providing information could result in their being identified or being brought before a court of law," the statement read.

- SAPA