The South African National Editors’ Forum (SANEF) strongly condemns the unlawful and intimidatory acts of students - aligned to the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) - against journalists. The students harassed and prevented eNCA journalists from covering the university protests in Johannesburg yesterday.
The South African National Editors’ Forum (SANEF) condemns the callous shooting of female Student Journalists from the University of Witwatersrand (Wits) by members of the South African Police Service while they were recording the student protests over the financial exclusion of some students.
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The South African National Editors’ Forum (SANEF) is deeply concerned that a News24 journalist has been allegedly subject to illegal surveillance and interception from the Crime Intelligence (CI) division which is a worrying trend, internationally, of targeting journalists to curtail factual and honest news coverage.
News24 informed SANEF that their lawyer had sent a letter to the acting head of the CI Lieutenant-General Yolisa Mokgabudi, demanding that “those within Crime Intelligence participating in these activities, immediately be ordered to cease all further unlawful interception of News24 journalists’ communication, their surveillance and/or general intimidation”.
According to News24 its investigative journalist Jeff Wicks has allegedly been “followed and his communications” allegedly intercepted due to his coverage of the “internal turf” struggles inside the CI. They allege that other journalists may also be under surveillance.
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The South African National Editors’ Forum (SANEF) has learnt with great sadness of the passing of journalist Karima Brown after suffering Covid-19 complications.
Brown, who hosted ‘The Fix’ on eNCA and was a well-known political commentator, had been hospitalised for several weeks in the intensive care unit after contracting Covid-19. She held many senior positions in the South African media industry, including a senior producer at SAfm current affairs, political editor at Business Day and executive editor for the Independent Group.
Her death follows a tragic death of four journalists in one week in January also due to COVID-19 complications. It was Sunday Independent news editor and investigative journalist Solly Maphumulo; Former Cape Argus photographer Enver Essop; resource coordinator in the SABC newsroom in KZN, Ismail Jinnah, and senior political journalist Knowledge Simelane of Ilanga Newspaper in KwaZulu-Natal.