Media rights organisations have likened Jacob Zuma’s private prosecution of journalist Karyn Maughan to a strategic lawsuit against public participation (SLAPP) case — aimed at silencing her.
Advocate Catherine Kruyer, on behalf of the Campaign for Free Expression, Media Monitoring Africa Trust and the South African National Editors Forum, said the aim was to “deprive us (South Africans) the opportunity of hearing what she had to say”.
“We are not suggesting that journalists should have a get-out-of-jail card. We are just highlighting that journalists should be protected from abusive litigation.”
The media rights organisations were admitted as amici curiae in applications brought by Maughan and senior state advocate Billy Downer seeking to quash the private prosecution.
Zuma has accused them of contravening the NPA Act through the leak of what he says was a document containing his private medical information.
The document was submitted to judge Piet Koen, who was hearing Zuma’s arms deal-related trial, in an application for a postponement due to his ill-health.
Kruyer, in her submissions to judges Gregory Kruger, Thokozile Masipa and Jacqui Henriques, sitting in the Pietermaritzburg high court on Monday, said Maughan had done nothing wrong.
She had reported on a “public document”.
“It was reporting on criminal proceedings before court. Open justice is a key component of the rule of law. The open court principle is constitutionally entrenched,” she said.
Vuyani Ngalwana, representing Democracy in Action — also admitted as an amicus curiae — said constitutional rights to freedom of expression and the media, were not an impenetrable shield.
He urged the court to see the case through a “sociopolitical prism” — in a context where the views favoured by mainstream media, of which Maughan was a part, and the associated personalities “could do no wrong”.
“She is no ordinary litigant or citizen seeking to assert her rights. She is no Gogo Dlamini in some backwater village in Umlazi.
“She is in the forefront of shaping discourse. This case comes down to one question. It’s about a journalist seeking absolution from a criminal charge because she is a journalist, secure in the comfort that she has the entire mainstream media machine behind her.”
Ngalwana said there was the “ever lurking spectre of race”.
“Whether we like it or not, her race as a white South African will be important ... not in the minds of this court, obviously, but for ordinary people who look at judgments and wonder why this case is treated differently.”
He said the court would have to perform a balancing act between Maughan’s rights, and the rights of Zuma to human dignity, privacy and equality before the law.
“If this court grants the interdict and the review application, we submit it will thereby allow her rights to trump all the other rights.”
The case has adjourned until Wednesday when Zuma’s legal team is expected to make its submissions.
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Questions over power of the pen raised in Zuma private prosecution
Image: Sandile Ndlovu
Media rights organisations have likened Jacob Zuma’s private prosecution of journalist Karyn Maughan to a strategic lawsuit against public participation (SLAPP) case — aimed at silencing her.
Advocate Catherine Kruyer, on behalf of the Campaign for Free Expression, Media Monitoring Africa Trust and the South African National Editors Forum, said the aim was to “deprive us (South Africans) the opportunity of hearing what she had to say”.
“We are not suggesting that journalists should have a get-out-of-jail card. We are just highlighting that journalists should be protected from abusive litigation.”
The media rights organisations were admitted as amici curiae in applications brought by Maughan and senior state advocate Billy Downer seeking to quash the private prosecution.
Zuma has accused them of contravening the NPA Act through the leak of what he says was a document containing his private medical information.
The document was submitted to judge Piet Koen, who was hearing Zuma’s arms deal-related trial, in an application for a postponement due to his ill-health.
Kruyer, in her submissions to judges Gregory Kruger, Thokozile Masipa and Jacqui Henriques, sitting in the Pietermaritzburg high court on Monday, said Maughan had done nothing wrong.
She had reported on a “public document”.
“It was reporting on criminal proceedings before court. Open justice is a key component of the rule of law. The open court principle is constitutionally entrenched,” she said.
Vuyani Ngalwana, representing Democracy in Action — also admitted as an amicus curiae — said constitutional rights to freedom of expression and the media, were not an impenetrable shield.
He urged the court to see the case through a “sociopolitical prism” — in a context where the views favoured by mainstream media, of which Maughan was a part, and the associated personalities “could do no wrong”.
“She is no ordinary litigant or citizen seeking to assert her rights. She is no Gogo Dlamini in some backwater village in Umlazi.
“She is in the forefront of shaping discourse. This case comes down to one question. It’s about a journalist seeking absolution from a criminal charge because she is a journalist, secure in the comfort that she has the entire mainstream media machine behind her.”
Ngalwana said there was the “ever lurking spectre of race”.
“Whether we like it or not, her race as a white South African will be important ... not in the minds of this court, obviously, but for ordinary people who look at judgments and wonder why this case is treated differently.”
He said the court would have to perform a balancing act between Maughan’s rights, and the rights of Zuma to human dignity, privacy and equality before the law.
“If this court grants the interdict and the review application, we submit it will thereby allow her rights to trump all the other rights.”
The case has adjourned until Wednesday when Zuma’s legal team is expected to make its submissions.
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Support independent journalism by subscribing to the Sunday Times. Just R20 for the first month.
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