Tie a yellow ribbon….
From today this blog will wear a yellow ribbon. Why? Because my friends and colleagues are under attack. I have read that Sunday Times, journalist Jocelyn Maker and editor Mondli Makhanya, face arrest by the state on charges that they illegally possessed Health Minister Manto Tshablala-Msimang’s hospital records. My yellow ribbon will remain until they are free from threat, arrest or prosecution. Consider wearing one too.
Mondli’s response to this development is correct. He was quoted in his paper saying that all are equal before the law and that he and Jocelyn will face the music. They must know that they will not be standing in the dock alone should their arrest come to pass. All of us in this media business (except maybe for Dali Mpofu and his gang at the SABC) will stand with them shoulder to shoulder. This will be a great test of their courage which I personally can vouch knows no bounds.
The state may prosecute them and – let us not be coy about this – this is not about a health law, this is about revenge. Unfortunately, no one in government has yet worked out how to rewrite history – and the history that Mondli and Jocelyn have written is there to be read by all. Their real “crime” was exposing our health minister’s shameful abuse of her position and her behaviour which should shame any reasonable person, let alone a person in public office.
No doubt many will see this is an opening assault on the freedom of the press. I do. But the war is lost before it is even fought, I’m afraid. Mondli and Jocelyn have a powerful civil court judgment up their sleeves where their rights as journalists were asserted by our constitution in the health minister’s litigation against the paper.
And even without that the battle is still lost. The government will learn that our freedom is not their’s to give or take. It belongs to us. They may legislate, litigate, arrest, prosecute and threaten but our press has survived worse and it will survive this too.
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Its amazing how people in power hate being put in the light when they are wrong.Manto must realise that once you a dronkie, you will always be known as a dronkie.She is still promoting a couple of sips is okay.Shame on you imbiciles in power.
I too will be flying the yellow ribbon and encouraging others to do so. This is a sad day for South Africa.
[...] ribbon Then the editor of The Dispatch, Andrew Trench, is displaying a yellow ribbon on his blog which he will not remove until Mondi Makhanya and Jocelyn Maker until are “free from threat, [...]
[...] an interesting blog post which captures some of the impetus in this direction. It also mentions my yellow ribbon campaign (where I am rather flatteringly, if incorrectly, described as the editor of the Dispatch) Tags: [...]
Hey Andrew
Great work. shall put yellow ribbon all over facebook. can’t figure out government’s logic; surely they know – as we former staffers know – there is no way in hell that the Sunday Times will back off from a fight of this magnitude. And that the proposed arrest of Mondli will be a cause celebre around the world? Does Mbeki and that ridiculous cariciature of a woman really think that these already-reported ‘indiscretions’ won’t be rehashed ad nauseum in court? And that more wonderful stuff, long suppressed, will bubble to the top, as scum invariably does? I, for one, look forward to seeing the minister on the stand…
Hey Glenda, nice hearing from you. Thanks – and don’t be a stranger here now 
