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Based on nothing but the truth

I WAS at the African Media Leadership Forum recently, chatting to Peter Cunliffe-Jones (name-drop alert). An old Africa hand, journalist and author, Peter worked for AFP for many years and is now with AfricaCheck, the online “non-partisan organisation that exists to promote accuracy in public debate and the media in Africa”, a project of the AFP Foundation.

Something to be both feared and welcomed by all journalists, it checks up on facts (not opinions), and has skewered a vast range of people for presenting wrongful claims that cannot be backed up by solid evidence.

Recently they ran a check on Sanral’s claim of creating some 29 000 ‘average equivalent full-time jobs’, for example, and found it was significantly inflated. They pointed out that the Pres was wrong to say we’ve invested $14m in renewables – it’s more like R13.4 BILLION.

And they pointed out that Vavi’s Tweet claiming South Africa had lost R700bn to corruption in the last 20 years was little more than a thumbsuck – following the trail of the claim right back to its source, and eventually concluding that, essentially, the total figure was unknowable.

Peter was filling me in on the Free Market Foundation Leon Louw’s recent run-in with AfricaCheck. AfricaCheck’s first salvo began: “Did 1.2 million black people earn more than R400,000 in 2014? Are social grants the main source of income for 40% of black households? And did the percentage of black judges increase by 248% between 2000 and 2012?

“These were some of the claims made by the head of South Africa’s Free Market Foundation. Leon Louw wrote that 'despite the fact that there has been a spectacular amount of transformation [in South Africa], the established consensus is that little has changed and that whites still own everything'.

“President of the Progressive Professionals Forum, Jimmy Manyi, quoted many of the claims verbatim in a City Press opinion piece. Editor of the Financial Mail, Tim Cohen, shared the article on Twitter, calling it a ‘tour-de-force by Leon Louw’.
“But when Africa Check wrote to Louw asking for evidence to support the claims, it took him six weeks to provide a list of sources, but most of them did not support his claims…”

Do go and read the whole thing –and then the comment, it’s really worth it. Especially for those of you who like good, forensic analysis. It’s a thought-provoking exercise that shows clearly what constitutes evidence of fact, and what doesn’t.

As a science writer, I’ve had to learn the hard way that you have to have a credible, solid foundation for facts. (And I still slip up from time to time – which is why editors, and other checks and balances, are so important.) I like to give links to sources so that readers can go and trawl through them for themselves – and isn’t clickability one of the joys of modern technology, otherwise I’d be referring you to the Bodleian Library or the Library of Congress, or somewhere equally inaccessible.

Anton Harber provided a punch-line to this story in a recent column in Business Day: “…the South African Institute of Race Relations, a body that built its name on the rigour of its research, said it would no longer co-operate with AfricaCheck. CEO Frans Cronjé launched a bizarre attack that seemed to suggest it was part of a socialist conspiracy to incite conflict in our society. He was rushing to the defence of Leon Louw […] Why should he [provide evidence], Cronje asked, as if there were no responsibility on those who enter the public arena to strive for accuracy.”

Which there should be, of course. Harber closed with a challenge, “to this newspaper and other publishers. If you are committed to the Press Code’s rules on accuracy and the value of self-regulation, should you publish the views of those who do not willingly subject themselves to fact-checking? Are you not undermining a fundamental journalistic value?”

I want to endorse and support that challenge. If the media is to fulfil its vital role as watchdog demanding accountability for figures in power in the state and civil society, it should also demand accountability from those it gives regular and generous airtime to, the so-called expert opinions. You know who I mean: people like – oh, Anton Harber himself, the go-to man for quotes on journalism (and I’m sure he’d be happy to oblige).

Those economists, so few in number, who grace the pages of newspapers regularly and whose voices are heard on air. The health ‘experts’ – I’ve got one in my sights at the moment; I want to pin her to the wall and demand her list of references for some of the claims she’s been airily airing. The engineers and accountants who opine about climate change ‘facts’ based on the words of a non-scientist like Christopher Monckton.

Claims of fact (not opinion or interpretation) made in the media should be verifiable. No, you shouldn’t have to provide a long paper trail every time you write a column or opinion piece – but if asked by your editor or an organisation like AfricaCheck to verify a factual claim you have made, you should be ready and willing to oblige, not recalcitrant and obstructive.

Readers make decisions and acquire beliefs based on what you write. Let it be founded on the truth, insofar as the truth can be known.

*Mandi Smallhorne is a versatile journalist and editor. Views expressed are her own. Follow her on twitter.


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