Don’t let disinformation undermine your vote

Community members and the media gathered for a discussion on disinformation and its impact on the elections at the Goethe Institut in Parkwood on 6 May.

Committee member for the protection of journalists Angela Quintal, commissioner Janet Love of the IEC, journalist and editor Ranjeni Munusamy and German ambassador to South Africa Martin Schafer engaged in a panel discussion, sharing their insights on the matter and its threat to free and fair elections.

Munusamy opened the discussion by saying, “Information which was supposed to empower the electorate has been weaponised. I don’t believe we were sufficiently prepared for this changing environment. Social media has become a major factor in this year’s election discourse.”

Quintal said, “Journalists are under attack throughout sub-Saharan Africa, especially in countries with autocratic governments who press criminal charges against critical journalists. Since 2016, when Donald Trump was elected, we have seen an increase in these attacks and intimidation of journalists.” She added that this had silenced a number of female journalists and made younger journalists shy away from political reporting.

Love discussed disinformation she had encountered since the start of this election season. Examples she listed included stories telling people with false nails that they could not vote, stories stating that supporters of particular political parties could only vote on certain days and stories of ballot boxes being deliberately opened and photos of these open boxes being published to undermine the election process.

When asked about practices used in Germany to tackle misinformation, Schafer stated that all countries were in unchartered territory in this regard. “Internet has sped up the spread of disinformation and the repression of journalists,” said Schafer.

Munusamy pointed to the pressures encountered in newsrooms including the speed at which stories needed to be released to keep up with competitors and the immediacy of information on social media which could lead to inaccuracies.

“The media game has changed significantly and we as media need to present verified, in-depth information to the public to stay in the game,” said Munusamy.

Munusamy believes that journalists have become targets for misinformation because of the threat they can present for corrupt political parties. She gave the example of Ace Magashule who used the ‘fake news’ tag to defend his alleged acts of corruption when they were reported by journalists.

Love said the public needed to receive more education about misinformation to counter the threat this posed to the elections. She also challenged political parties to engage actively with people on the ground so that people received information directly from parties themselves instead of receiving all the information on social media.

Community members are encouraged to report digital disinformation on www.real411.org

Related articles:

https://www.citizen.co.za/rosebank-killarney-gazette/252337/elections-2019-voting-checklist/

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