Is the Media Free?

Are South Africa’s dominant media equipped to serve the information and expression needs of our divided society? . Can they enable the inclusive and informed public sphere our democracy desperately needs to negotiate the many challenges we face? The highly concentrated nature of media ownership,the commercial business model of the dominant media (including the public broadcaster), and the under resources news rooms dependent on elite sources (largely corporate/government spin) pr has resulted in a largely homogeneous media that tend to focus on concerns of urban and middle-class people at the expense of the marginalised majority. As we commemorate the banning of anti-apartheid newspapers and Black Consciousness organisations on ”Black Wednesday”, October 19, 1977, we ask: Where are the voices o the oppressed and exploited in the media today?