Haffajee does it for white masters – Sowetan

Name of article: Haffajee does it for white masters

Name of journalist: Eric Miyeni

Name of publication: Sowetan

Date: 01 August 2011

Country: South Africa

Theme: Media, racism and gender violence

Skills: Language and perspective

Genre: Opinion

GEM classification: Gender blind

Ferial Haffajee, editor of City Press, exposed Julius Malema’s family trust which brought about Eric Miyeni’s opinion piece on Haffajee’s allegations. Miyeni uses gender insensitive and emotive language, using words that are racist (Haffajees of this racist world), metaphors (a black snake in the grass…) to describe Haffajee and nouns that objectify the subject .i.e. calling her “‘a’ Haffajee” instead of “Haffajee”. By using “a”, he reinforces stereotypes of women being seen as objects.

Haffajee is a strong and well respected woman in the media industry, and has achieved what many aspiring female journalists hope to achieve. She was previously editor of The Mail & Guardian and now edits City Press, one of South Africa’s largest weekend newspapers. She is perceived as one of the few women in South Africa who have broken the Glass Ceiling by becoming the editor of two prominent newspapers known to be dominated by male editors.

After writing an article about tea girls, “Tea girls of the world unite”, and stating clearly that she is not a tea girl and she was not born to make tea because it is a task all girls should know how to do, she is referred to as a servant (tea-girl) of the white master. Haffajee is an editor, when one refers to her as a servant it degrades her position. It therefore raises questions about who the master she serves is. Is it the DA leaders or the “people that have groomed her”, the Mail and Guardian?

It is important to note that this article is an opinion piece which means that the columnist has the rights to his opinion and thus cannot be entirely reprimanded for his actions, like removing him off his column. However, he has an obligation as a professional journalist to uphold the journalistic codes of ethics and become gender sensitive.

Headlines
Haffajee does it for white masters. In order to analyse this headline we need to use assumptions. The journalist refers to Haffajee as a servant to the white masters, an issue which she had raised in an article of her own. During local government elections, she wrote an article about Malema’s comment that Lindiwe Mazibuko is a “tea girl” serving their mistress Helen Zille. In Miyeni’s article she, Haffajee, is referred to as a servant. It is not mentioned who the white masters are but it can be assumed that it is the DA leader because this article is based on racial issues. How the DA gets money from white businesses and no one accuses them of theft but when it is Malema of the ANC there is corruption involved, “Haffajees uttered hatred for ANC politicians. Although this headline is relevant to the story, it degrades Haffajee’s dignity as a woman and as an editor. It also portrays stereotypes that women are born to serve their masters.

Sources
There is only one source to this story being the journalist himself because he writes his opinion on the claims made by the City Press editor Haffajee. However he uses additional data about the Medium that was closed because of hacking into the private lives of England citizens.

Language
The language is highly emotive, indicating that he was writing on a topic sensitive to him. “Black snake”, “burning tyre around her neck”, “a wave of self-hatred”, “nauseate”, “sickeningly”, “to hell with Haffajee”, and “quadruple crap”. All these words used are insulting and unethical.

He believes that Haffajee hates the colour of her skin and feels nauseas when she sees herself in the mirror. Women are people who love the way they look, their looks means a lot to them and when she despises herself she becomes bitter at the black race and claims they are bad (Malema’s allegations of the trust fund). Miyeni feels that Haffajee is not doing justice to her kind (the blacks) by exposing Malema.

The reference of a human to a black snake is inappropriate because of the connotations associated with snakes; i.e. dangerous and devious, which is what Miyeni calls Haffajee. She exposed Malema’s family trust fund issues unexpectedly. She cannot be trusted because she is “deployed by white capital to sow discord among blacks”.
The word master refers to a male who is dominant than his servant. The word is outdated and therefore brings back the wounds of apartheid. This means that Miyeni is rising racial and gender issues using Haffajee as a servant. The word “master” could be replaced with “mentor or boss”, which is not gender segregated.

Sowetan is a family newspaper, using words such as “to hell with Haffajee” is vulgar. Language that is not ethical. When writing this article Miyeni should have omitted such language.

Visual image
The visual image of this article is headshot of the journalist. Does not say anything about the story told.

Story angle and perspective
The perspective of the story is that women are always seen as servants, and men their masters. Therefore, “Haffajee does it for white masters”. Even if women hold high positions in their workplace, men like Miyeni always try to bring them down. This article does not challenge stereotypes but rather reinforces them.

The story makes judgment on Haffajee that she serves “white masters” which in turn criticizes her role as editor of a major newspaper. An editor is the head of the newsroom, seen as credible, and has the final decision making authority. “Can we be sure that City Press did not manufacture these facts? If it didn’t, how do we know it didn’t break the law to obtain them.” This shows that Miyeni is questioning Haffajee’s credibility.

Placement and positioning
The article is at the bottom of page 9, which shows that it wasn’t given prominence but made headlines regardless of that fact. However, the background colour gives the article importance over other articles on the page. Furthermore, the headline is written in capital letters which places the article in a position to attract the reader. Page 9 like page 1 and three is on the right side of the newspaper which is of greater importance than page 2, 4, 6 et cetera. Because a reader’s gaze is most likely to be from right to left placing the article on the right side gives it more value.

Training exercise
1. What is the theme that dominates this article? Why do you think it dominates?
2. What angle would you use to tell this story?
3. Looking at journalistic ethical codes what language should be omitted in the writing of this article?

Other training material

Publication: Glass Ceilings report, South Africa

Report: Workshop on Covering Gender Based Violence in the Media: South Africa

Publication: Leading in a different language: Will women change the news media?