Watchdog watching itself: Analysis of media discourse on the ethical breach in the Pretoria News story of the Tembisa 10 babies

Abstract

The media is often described as the fourth estate that exercises checks and balances over the executive, judicial and legislative arms of the State. This idea reflects the realisation that the media acts as the counter-power (Marsili 2021:24) that fulfils their normative societal role in many ways. Among others, they set the agenda for public debate and can make or destroy reputations. They are also described as the watchdog that holds politicians accountable and demands the highest standards of ethical conduct from them. However, any power can be abused and thus needs checks and balances (Curran et al 1982). If the media are the watchdogs of other forms of power in society, who then watches the watchdogs? The answer is to be found in mechanisms of self-regulation (Krüger 2009:12) and media accountability structures. The publication of a story by Pretoria News and the Independent Group in June 2021 about the birth of ten babies (Pretoria News 2021) was therefore a turning point in South African journalism and brought into sharp focus, the importance of media accountability. The story caused a huge media storm and drew widespread criticism from within the industry and outside. It set the agenda for debate about media ethics, the role of journalists in society, ‘fake news’, and the effectiveness of South Africa’s print media self-regulatory regime. Using the analysis of content and media discourse, this research revisits the role of journalists in society and explores media accountability and intermedia agenda-setting theory to understand how leading news media and commentators reacted to the ethical breach. It found that media accountability is alive in South Africa’s print media landscape and confirmed that the watchdog can indeed watch itself by speaking out against the subversion of media ethics.