By Anton HarberFirst published on GroundUp When journalist Bongani Hans of Independent Newspapers received a court order last week to stop him publishing allegations against a Durban solar energy company, it was the ninth recent case to enlist such an order to gag journalists, activists and whistleblowers. Companies and state officials are increasingly abusing court Read more >
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Image: Abahlali baseMjondolo A report released in August 2024 once again casts light on the disproportionate victimisation, harassment, and killings of members of Abahlali baseMjondolo (Abahlali), South Africa’s largest social movement representing the interests of shack dwellers, the homeless, and the poor. The organisation supports millions who have lost hope for a better life and Read more >
Malawian journalist and activist Gregory Gondwe is on the run. He is being hunted by police and military police after publishing an exposé on a questionable – and substantial – payment made by that country’s defence force to a firm implicated in corruption. The payment was part of a larger deal secured for the purchase Read more >
Corruption Watch (CW) heeded the call to input into the next report of the Special Rapporteur on human rights defenders, which will be presented to the UN General Assembly in October 2023. Submissions were to centre on the specific challenges faced by women human rights defenders (WHRDs) working in conflict, post-conflict, or crisis-affected settings. With Read more >
World Whistle-blower Day is marked every year on 23 June. It’s tempting to say we ‘celebrate’ it, but in today’s world whistle-blowing is no cause for celebration – especially not for those who report and expose corruption in an increasingly hostile space. The very fact that we need to have whistle-blowers is in itself no Read more >
Image: Col André Kritzinger, used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. Addressed to: Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa Office of the President of the Republic of South Africa Office of the Speaker of Parliament Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Transport PRASA, hands off whistleblowers We, the undersigned organisations, call on the Passenger Rail Agency Read more >
By Janine Erasmus The life of an activist in South Africa is as fraught with danger as that of a whistle-blower. Both stand up to corruption and in so doing, put their safety, and even their lives, on the line. Both suffer abuse, ridicule, and harassment from the perpetrators of corruption as well as the Read more >
When wrong-doers are protected, whistle-blowers are often the ones who end up being punished, while the culprit smugly carries on with their shenanigans. So it was in the case of the misbehaving principal vs the school governing body (SGB) of Walter Sisulu Primary School in Olivenhoutbosch, Centurion. Gauteng Education MEC Payaza Lesufi went on national Read more >
Transparency International (TI), the global anti-corruption movement, has joined the #ProtectJournalists campaign launched in 2015 by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and supported by a coalition of more than 130 NGOs and media outlets. The campaign calls for the creation of a Special Representative of the UN secretary-general for the Safety of Journalists, a move that will help to enforce international law Read more >