S.A. press shackles tightened

Press, 10 January 1987, Page 8

S.A. press shackles tightened

NZPA-Reuter Johannesburg South Africa clamped sweeping new curbs on its own press yesterday, severely restricting news or comment about black guerrilla groups. A police order issued under emergency regulations bars newspapers from printing reports or advertisements which improve the image or explain the policies of banned organisations. The order, published in a special Government Gazette, is aimed at the African National Congress (A.N.C.), which has waged a guerrilla war against the Government since it was outlawed in South

Africa in 1960. Lawyers said the new order prohibited the South African press from reporting anything that would put the A.N.C. in a favourable light. It could also bar news- ' papers from reporting calls for the Government to negotiate with the A.N.C., since this would imply recognition of the exiled movement, the lawyers said. The widely expected police action came hours after several newspapers printed full-page advertisements by antiapartheid groups calling on the Government to lift its ban on the A.N.C., which marked its seventyfifth anniversary yester-

day. The police had said they were investigating whether the advertisement broke the law, after receiving “numerous complaints” from members of the public. Several editors were notified of the new order as their newspapers were going to print last night. Mr Anton Harber, editor of the Left-wing “Weekly Mail,” said a blank space would appear in today’s edition where the advertisement would have been. The advertisement, signed by leaders of the two-million-strong United Democratic Front and other dissident groups,

carried a photograph of the A.N.C. President, Oliver Tambo, who may not be quoted in South Africa under strict security legislation. It also showed a silhouette of Nelson Mandela, the A.N.C. leader jailed for life in 1964 on subversion charges. Publication of his photograph requires Government consent. Pro-Government newspapers refused to print the advertisement, which called on the Government to “let the A.N.C. speak for itself.” The violence which has swept South Africa’s townships since early 1984 continued with an attack on the home of a black

singer who helped record a controversial Government peace song. The Bureau for Information said Abigail Khubeka was injured by flying glass when her home in Soweto, near Johannesburg, was petrolbombed on Thursday. Blacks who joined the multi-racial group of singers and musicians assembled by the Government to record “Together we Will Build a Brighter Future” have been labelled "sell-outs” by black radicals. The house of a blind black singer who took part in the project, Steve Kekana, was petrolbombed last month.