SANCTIONS SATIETY
The media: Paul Johnson
complains about the bullying of television viewers over South Africa
ONE of the consequences of the lack of competition in our duopoly television sys- tem is that the British public is being bored and bullied almost out of its senses by the BBC-ITN obsession with South Africa. It is clear from a number of indicators that viewers are not particularly eager for news about South Africa, or rather are extreme- ly sceptical about the kind of news, or news', which is thrust at them. A lot of them have relatives or friends in southern Africa, not just the Republic; a surprising number have been there on holidays and sits. Few British people buy the sanctions line. They think that sanctions will not Work or, in so far as they do, will hurt blacks more than whites. With a sensible instinct, they do not see how conditions in Africa can be improved by smashing up its economy, or trying to. Underneath this is a deeper feeling that the whole of Africa is in a pretty horrifying mess, but that there is precious little Britain can do about it, other than contribute to Band Aid, Sport Aid etc (and there is scepticism about these also). The idea that events, or non-events, in South Africa should dominate British hews-bulletins seems absurdly disprop- ortionate to them. Moreover, the South African coverage is slanted. I don't think there is any great Conspiracy in the BBC, for instance, to doctor the news systematically. It is just that, in the culture from which the BBC recruits its people nowadays, it never occurs to anyone to question the wisdom of sanctions, or the inevitability of black rule triumphing, or the moral probity of partici- pants like the Mandelas. I notice that the BBC World Service, whose staff tend to come from a rather different background, has a much more balanced and objective coverage of the world. There are a number of ways in which BBC treatment of South African news is tendentious. First a regular formula is used stating that the news being broadcast from South Africa is being subject to restric- tions. This applies to a great many coun- tries — all the Soviet bloc, for instance, most African countries, most Arab coun- tries — but I do not recall this warning being given before. If it is necessary to caution viewers that the reporter is not able to tell them the whole truth, should this not apply to all countries, and not just the one country which the Left has in its sights at present? Again, there is an intense selectivity in those chosen to comment on events in South Africa. It would be impossible to count the number of times Archbishop Tutu, for instance, has given his opinion on BBC news bulletins. But by no stretch of the imagination can he be considered a disinterested observer. When I was in South Africa a year or two ago, he came out with the extraordinary statement that the Africans would welcome Soviet rule. Again, there are the innumerable appear- ances of Mrs Winnie Mandela. In present- ing her constantly, the BBC is remarkably reluctant to point out that she is in favour of violence and, in particular, refuses to condemn the brutal murder of her fellow Africans by 'necklaces', i.e. burning peo- ple to death by lighting petrol-filled car- tyres round their necks. Neither Tutu nor Mrs Mandela is an objective witness; both could be expected to do well out of a black nationalist regime. Their views should be balanced by others.
Balance is, or ought to be, the rule in any coverage. But it is particularly impor- tant in South Africa, which has an im- mensely complicated racial and tribal structure and a bewildering variety of conflicting interests. This is not made clear to BBC viewers. The impression is given that the ANC, which supports violence and is pro-Soviet, speaks for all blacks. That is quite untrue, but non-ANC black opinion rarely gets a hearing. Again, BBC cover- age suggests all blacks favour sanctions. Not so: it is essentially an ANC policy. The blacks are divided on the issue, as on most other things; nearly all the customary opponents of apartheid, such as homeland and tribal leaders, white liberals, Cape Coloureds, Asians, for instance, oppose sanctions. But we hardly ever hear from these quarters.
There is another way in which television coverage is bent: the constant use, in the language of news bulletins, of what I call the Tendentious Dynamic, otherwise known as the Mounting Syndrome. This journalistic distortion is by no means con- fined to the South African issue or to television coverage. It is a very general media failing. What it involves, in essence, is the use of verbal devices, in reporting the news, not merely to describe what has happened but to assert what is going to happen, and indeed ought to happen. It is an old Agitprop device springing from the Marxist concept of historical inevitability. Thus, opposition to the South African regime is not merely widespread but mounting. Leon Brittan is 'the first senior Tory ex-minister to come out in favour of sanctions'. Withdrawals from the Com- monwealth Games are 'swelling from a trickle to a flood'. The use of verbal dynamics is designed to nudge event in a particular direction and to persuade the viewer (or reader) that irresistible forces are at work. The BBC's deployment of the Mounting Syndrome conveys the view that sanctions are inevitable and that it is only a matter of time before the British Govern- ment is forced to impose them. It also implies that the ANC speaks for all blacks, or will shortly do so. No doubt the ANC is gaining ground, since it is murdering its opponents with 'necklaces% but that is the kind of awkward fact the BBC is not too keen to report.
In all this, I think ITN has rather missed an opportunity to show not merely that it runs a much better news-service than the BBC — we all know that — but that it can produce more balanced bulletins. Instead it has tended to trail in the BBC's wake, allowing a one-sided version of South African events to push other more interest- ing and important news off the screen. I fear that, so long as British television is dominated by monopoly, factors, we will never get the multi-faceted portrayal of events from which the truth emerges.
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