Journo blog

Responsibilities of journalists during election time By Qaqamba Matundu Media organisations and journalists plays a vital role in the electoral process by assuring the dissemination of news and diverse opinions. Media makes possible deeper knowledge of candidates, parties and their programs. Journalists contribute to the effective participation of citizens in democratic debate, especially by ensuring that issue of public interest remain at the centre of election campaign.  Reports as “Journalists must resist the pressure of their own opinion which they should express in the privacy of voting station, like any other citizen. They are expected to treat all politicians impartially regardless of the sympathies or antipathies they may feel towards them. A professional work of journalism must be accurate, verified, balanced, neutral and respectful of human dignity. Journalists must have rights to provide information without being pressured or threatened, bring with it the duty to provide vot

Does NSFAS need to increase allowance? By Qaqamba Matundu With prices of everything increasing in South Africa. The cost of living is high. Students are the ones suffering the most with the “little” allowance they get. “Over fifty thousand people, many of whom are university students have signed a petition imploring Minister of Higher Education Blade Nzimande and National Students Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) to increase their allowance. They want the current allowance of R1,500 to be increased to R2000 to accommodate the increase cost of essentials like groceries and toiletries.” Says Enoch Many students across the country come from unprivileged homes whereby they do not get any allowance from parents. It is not easy for students to afford everything as they need to buy food , toiletries and others do not qualify to get transport money, so they also use some of the money for transport to school. Students come from different provinces far away from their home, they are on their own. Ma

Why are people not voting? Qaqamba Matundu Many people do not vote because they believe they don’t understand enough about the  government, the election process or individual party policies. Others have less interest on  politics and supporting a political party, so they believe their votes will go to waste if they  vote so they decide not to. “The 2021 local government elections had low voter turnout since the advent of democracy  in South Africa. There are 26.2 million registered voters in South Africa however 42.6 million  people are eligible to do so with over 40% of them choosing not to. IEC Chief Electoral  Officer Sy Mamabolo said that this could be blamed on several factors including Covid-19  pandemic” says EWN reporter Mahlakoana South Africa is not alone in facing declining voter participation. Internationally, this is a trend  that has been documented since the 1990s. Nonetheless, falling turnout is a critical  barometer of the health of the past-apartheid democratic projec

 The Marikana massacre relevance today and South Africans obligement to view the award-winning documentary. By Qaqamba Matundu The killing of 34 miners by the police at Marikana in August 2012 was the largest massacre at civilians in South Africa since Sharpeville massacre. The event has been covered in newspapers articles, on tv news and in commission of inquiry but the is still confusion of what happened on that fateful day’. (Tshetlo,2019). Today that event is relevantnt because, that incident happened under the constitutional democracy and the strikers were shot by the government workers, the South African Police Service (SAPS). This event came after the conflict of wages. ‘The strike was for wage increase and to address the poor living conditions of miners and their families in Marikana. These problems were not formally addressed by NUM or by Lonmin during the strike many of the strikers instead began losing their jobs and protesters were met unrelenting hostility by the security,

The purpose of this video is to address mental health issues. Stigma is an extreme barrier to those needing mental treatment. My goal is to destigmatize mental health issues. Both men and women get affected by mental health issues but it is always overlooked on males. It goes untreated because they are not likely to seek treatment so depression and suicide are one of the causes of death on men. Those experiencing mental health issues are often considered weak, broken and not strong enough. I also spoke about toxic masculinity-traditional cultural norms of how a man is supposed to behave. Again, on the video I spoke about ways on how to deal with mental health issues, this includes counselling and benefits of it. Counselors do not judge, they sit there and listen to your stories, offer comfort and console you. Secondly talking to people about your feelings especially those you trust or family members helps , avoid alcohol and other drugs, drinking is not a good way to manage difficu

 The land question in South Africa By Qaqamba Matundu The background on the issue of the land reform in South Africa is as follows, it has been said that the original sin of apartheid was dispossession of land in 1913 by the means of legislation –the Native Land Act -by the government at the time, which created a system of land ownership that deprived most South Africans of the right to own land. It resulted in most of the land being held by the white minority, while the black population -including colored and Indian communities were dispossessed of their land. The Act restricted people of color from buying or occupying land and over time, most of these people were relocated to ‘homelands and townships. As a result, breadwinners were often forced to look for work far away from their homes which led to range of related socio-economic problems. Despite the Act being repealed in 1991, the land reform process has been slow and, in many cases, ineffective, leaving many still landless and li

 Reuters Journalism By Qaqamba Matundu The 10 fundamentals of journalism practices in Reuters includes accuracy which is a central norm in journalism and is at the heart of journalistic practice. The history of accuracy is closely related to other central concepts in journalism like truthfulness, factuality, and credibility because it raises epistemological questions of whether and how journalism is capable of depicting reality accurately, truthfully and based on facts. Accuracy plays a particularly significant role in the factuality of the journalists not only to ground their reporting on facts but check whether the presented facts are true or not. Accuracy is an important standard to determine the quality of the news reporting. Perceives report as “In journalistic capacity, making mistakes are not good. Your mistake can be a typo or some oversight that may be seen insignificant, words matter, and words have consequences. The only ethical option would be to address the mistake, make

  Who has influence on the media By Qaqamba Matundu When it comes to who has the influence on the media, journalists, and what stories to appear in the media in South Africa, it has been reported that "The government has been able to keep media wrapped around its finger since the beginning of media. This can lead to unfair advantage in a political race between parties that are making campaigns that are running the other reputation with, for all we know, false information. The public has even been known to have a change in opinions after watching or reading a source from the media. The government has learnt how to persuade everyone, which is why our voices are more important than ever in our generation. The government is taking control of the media making it harder for individuals to form valid opinions without it being influenced." (ukessays,2018) Perceives report as ''In August 2017 came an announcement that the former government spokesperson and so called &q

 South Africa’s June 2022 Consumer Price Index By Qaqamba Matundu Consumer price inflation raced to 7.4% in June from 6.5% in May, 1,1% month-on-month in June 2022. “This is the highest reading since January 2017 when the rate was 6.6%, with inflation now higher than the upper limit of the South African Reserve Bank’s monetary policy target range of 6%, pointing to further interest rate hikes in July” says BusinessTech. Consequently, the trend pointed up mildly, with annual average inflation coming in at 5.7% in June (May: 5.5%). Lastly, core inflation rose to 4.4% in June, from May’s 4.1%. The result was driven by rising prices for housing and utilities and transportation says focus economics. Food and non-alcoholic beverages increased by 8.6% year-on-year and contributed 1.5 percentage points to the total CPI annual rate of 7.4%, said Stats SA. Stats SA chief director for price statistics Patrick Kelly said if annual consumer inflation is recalculated without including food and non-a

 Covering elections: Are journalists safe? By Qaqamba Matundu Democracy always rests on the rights to freely express diverse opinions and on the votes of well informed citizens. Media organizations and journalists play a vital role in the electoral process by assuring the dissemination of news and diverse opinions. Media makes deeper knowledge of candidates, parties and their programs. Journalists contribute to the effective participation of citizens in democratic debate by ensuring that issues of public interest remain at the center of election campaigns. This article is all about dealing in with challenges that can prevent a journalism to cover news during election times and whether or not do I believe journalists have to be card-carrying especially those coverings politics and elections. During an election time period, a journalist encounters multiple pressures. They may come from government especially in countries which democracy remains fragile; from political parties, which use

  Media Ethics By Qaqamba Matundu Journalistic ethics are common values that guide reporters. They lay out both the aspirations and obligations that journalists, editors and others working in the field should follow to execute their work responsibly. Now what are ethics? According to a report I read by Andrews George, ethics is a study of what is right or wrong in human conduct. I believe ethics governs the way people behave when doing something for example, last week I was playing a board game called 30 seconds with my classmates. The game governs us on how to behave and act as we conduct the play. You do not do as you do please, same thing applies on journalism. Both morality and ethics loosely have to do with distinguishing the difference between “good and bad” or “right and wrong”, but there is a difference between the two. Morality describes the principle that governs our behavior. Without these principles in place, societies cannot survive for long. Law according t

  The Global Financial Crisis of 2008 By Qaqamba Matundu The Global Financial crisis of 2008 was a critical economic crisis that affected the world. “It was primarily caused by deregulation in the financial industry that permitted banks to engage in hedge fund trading with derivates. Banks then demanded more mortgages to support the profitable sale of these derivatives. They created interest-only loans that became affordable to subprime borrowers” says Amadeo Paulson reported that “The company’s credit default swaps are generally cited as playing a major role in the collapse, losing American Insurance Group (AIG) $30 billion but they were not the only culprit. Securities lending a less-discussed facet of the business, lost AIG $21 billion and bears a large part of the blame, the authors concluded. AIG was accruing unpaid debts -collateral it owed its credit default swap partners but did not have to hand over due to the agreement collateral provision. But when AIG’s credit ratin

The zama zama attack By Qaqamba Matundu South Africa’s cost-of-living has worsened over the past ten years. SA economy shrunk below the size of what it was prior to the Covid-19 pandemic struck in the pandemic in the second quarter hit by damaging floods and severe power outages. That is why most South Africans decided to stage a protest over so many crises that include electricity crisis, high cost of living, high crime level involving illegal immigrants. On a Wednesday morning, 14 September, it was confirmed that the bodies of at least six suspected zama zama illegal miners were found badly wounded at the Maraisburg highway offramp. It is suspected that the zama zama infighting resulted to the attack. South Africa is currently struggling with the most depressing power cuts ever in history whereby people were introduced to stage six by Eskom which means people can have loadshedding for at least six hours a day. People cannot take it anymore. Everything around this country is upsettin