Groundup, another South African media organisation with feet of clay

Groundup is a Cape Town non-profit online magazine. According to its mission they “report news that is in the public interest, with an emphasis on the human rights of vulnerable communities. We want our stories to make a difference”.

 It was one of a dwindling handful of local online magazines I read, that is, until today. It reported on issues affecting the community including small stories that might not be published elsewhere. Its stories are often republished. I thought its reportage was honest and trenchant. I particularly liked its coverage of Cape Town's water crisis.  They published many of my letters about various topics except three, two of which were about public healthcare.

But I no longer read it because Groundup has revealed it’s little different to South Africa’s declining media.

The final straw for me was Khayelitsha Hospital under the spotlight about the hospital’s failure to address patients’ complaints. I wrote a letter in response to it. I have an intense interest in the subject which I disclosed (see my posts about the Western Cape Health Department and Groote Schuur Hospital). This is the second I time I wrote to Groundup about a health related matter.

First, in December last year to a health-related story I wrote to them in generic terms that the Western Cape Health Department’s Independence Health Complaints Committee was dysfunctional, relating my experience with it and head of department Dr Beth Engelbrecht (later posted here).  

Groundup journalist Barbara Maregele emailed me they wanted to do a story about it and to send her supporting documents, which I did. A few days later the editor, Nathan Geffen, emailed that with stories like that they prefer to "investigate" but due to the holiday closure on the 15th couldn’t get round to it.  He said he referred it to Health-e News, which as far as I know never ran the story.

I thought Geffen’s reason thin – the story could hold.  But except for been slightly annoyed they wasted my time, I thought little of it.

This is the second letter I wrote yesterday about health titled “By law the health department must address complaints”:

The article [Khayelitsha Hospital under the spotlight] does not say if TAC and patients referred complaints to the head of health department Dr Beth Engelbrecht, MEC Nomafrench Mbombo and Premier Helen Zille, which they can do if the hospital is not satisfactorily addressing complaints.

The National Health Act states healthcare providers – provinces for public health services – are obligated to address complaints. But I know from experience this is not the case. Complaints are inadequately investigated, covered up and/or minimised to deny and evade responsibility for poor service and negligence and to protect staff.

In December I wrote to Groundup, and provided evidence, about the dysfunctional Independent Health Complaints Committee. Engelbrecht emailed me it was not functioning, allegedly for "logistical reasons", after for two months promising it would investigate my complaints. She didn't say what the problem was, strange because she provides all IHCC's resources, or when it would be running again. She referred me to national agencies. This violates the act, which they didn't appear concerned about.

If I may offer TAC [Treatment Action Campaign] and complainants suggestions, if hospitals and clinics fail to properly address complaints, i.e., full investigations and reports and not the whitewashes one typically receive, within a reasonable period, send it to Engelbrecht. Request she investigates or call IHCC inquests. But since she has sole discretion, expect refusal on the inquests. And it’s probable she’ll pre-preemptively support her staff whatever the merits.

Don’t accept verbal findings, apparently a new thing with them – there’s deniability in unrecorded verbal reports especially when it implicates hospitals/clinics. They must provide written reports.

As a last resort if the above fail – with them expect it will – depending on the circumstances, lay a crimen injura charge against alleged offending staff, as I’ve recently done. It’s a long shot but crimen injuria includes a provision for verbal, psychological and emotional abuse, which many health service users experience and complain about. [End]

Today I received their reply “Regarding your letter” from info@groundup.org.za:

Dear Mr Johnson,

Thank you very much for taking the time to read and comment on the article. We will not be publishing the letter as your suggestions appear to be directed to TAC and therefore would be best if sent directly to the organisation.

Many thanks
GroundUp team

This is my response today:

Dear Nathan

Not publishing is at your discretion, of course. But with this excuse you're being disingenuous and dissembling. My suggestions were also directed at everyday complainants who are not TAC, i.e., most of them, and you know it was. 

I think the real reason is this is a fight you don't want to be part of, strange for a publication ostensibly committed to reporting on community issues and promoting their rights.  Is that a sham and for show?  Like last year when I wrote about the IHCC, you said you wanted to investigate but changed your mind (I didn't appreciate you wasting my time after I went to the trouble emailing you supporting documents).  

You know I have a dispute with the WC government and instituted criminal proceedings against them, and by posting my letter it might appear you're taking sides. If so, say so, otherwise don't publish and don't say why.  

Besides that, the latest letter and the one about the IHCC in December are of general interest about how they [WC government] are violating patients' rights and the law. I thought it's of interest to the public that the complaint process is seriously flawed at the highest level and complaints are mostly ignored, and you'd find that worthy of reporting, if not my case, then others. 

Why are you not investigating? Khayelitsha is symptomatic of a much wider problem. But you write around the issue, never getting to the nub, which is the WC government has no desire to investigate and address failures of the health service, no different to what led to [Life] Esidimeni. You're not helping, only sensationalising. That's more tabloid journalism than investigative, which is what you pretend you are. Also, you don't want to offend Zille & Co. 

I'm not annoyed you didn't publish as I've not had letters and articles published and not taken offense - I'm an adult. But you insult my intelligence with the specious and strange explanation. You should just have remained quiet. This proves the media publishes, not what's in the public's interest, but to serve a specific, often political agenda. And you don't want to offend those in power.

The media in South Africa is in a parlous state, and frequently dishonest, making "news", taking the moral high-ground and deciding what the social agenda is. I now regularly read few local publications and no print media. Daily Maverick, which I thought resurrected itself last year, left a lot to be desired and is going the way of print.  I rarely read it. That left only you, Politicsweb for varied and forthright commentary and The Conversation, whose writers display their politically correct credentials far too often for my liking. 

But now I know what Groundup and its editorial team are made of. I once defended you against criticism on social media but I see those may have been true. I've just given up on you too. 

BTW I suggest in future you don't say why you're not publishing letters. 

I shall post my original letter, your reply and this one.  On the subject in question see. [End]

*

Refer this article in The Conversation, South Africa’s print media is failing to empower citizens on corruption.  This article applies equally to online media. In my comment to the article I state inter alia:

“The media is dishonest, picking sides and setting themselves up as all that is right and holy when it suits them but not following their stated mandate of exposing corrupt and unlawful activities and providing information in the public interest. This is not the first time I’ve experienced where editors choose political and commercial expedience, self-censorship and possible factionalism and not offending those in power - political or business - over following the story and serving their readers and broader public.” 

It’s hard to know anymore on which side they stand.  Groundup apparently is reluctant to publish or investigate stories in the public interest. But it was not afraid to publish this long, possibly defamatory article by a biased, tendentious media “expert” who had a personal axe to grind - in more ways than one - with the object of his rant.  But  they say their mission is, “We value high-quality, ethical journalism. We are independent and do not promote any political party”.

Groundup let the author respond to a reasonable-sounding critic who had a problem with his attitude in an 800-word letter (their word limit is under 350), an unusual allowance for an op-ed writer who already was given more than adequate space to state his views. His response came across as even more petulant and thin-skinned than the article itself. I wrote saying what thought about it but they did not publish it.

Groundup has shown itself to be like most of the local media. The good exceptions are now down to one or two, typically independent, one-man shows, not mainstream and well-funded ones. (See here for Groundup’s donors that includes George Soros’ Open Society Foundation.)

If we can’t hold them to account then at least we don’t have to read them.  That’s still within our power.