By Charl van Rooyen, senior journalist at African Farming and Landbouweekblad
The second day of the major indaba on foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) outside Pretoria began controversially this morning (22 July) when the programme manager, Dipepenengeng Serage, Deputy Director-General in the Department of Agriculture, asked “the media” to leave the hall because he was concerned they would “report out of context” on some of the presentations.
At that point, it seemed as if I was the only media member in the hall, because I wanted to write comprehensively about the entire summit, unlike most media representatives on the first day, who were mainly only interested in Minister of Agriculture John Steenhuisen’s speech.
I asked him why the media had to leave the hall and he gave a lengthy explanation, stating someone might be misquoted and it would be difficult to correct it afterwards.
I said it didn’t make sense and started to make a voice recording of his explanation, to which he remarked I should have asked his permission. I told him I didn’t need his permission.
At one point, he handed me the microphone, and I introduced myself as a journalist who had been with Landbouweekblad for 36 years and had worked for Media24/Naspers for 51 years. I mentioned this was the first time I had ever been asked to leave a meeting.
A farmer then asked whether the farmers should also leave the hall because they are not specialists and might not understand the technical matters correctly.
Willie Aucamp, DA MP, stood up and objected, saying it gives the wrong impression that the department might have something to hide.
After a few minutes of back-and-forth, I walked to the back and announced that I was leaving the hall under protest. Serage then relented and said it wasn’t necessary to go. I returned to my seat at the front of the hall to applause.
Ironically, it’s still unclear to me why I couldn’t stay. It was also not clear which presentations were supposed to remain hidden from me. Serage merely said at the beginning that “the media” would be called back later.
The first two presentations of the morning were both delivered by representatives of the Department of Agriculture. Dr Mpho Maja, Director of Animal Health, spoke comprehensively about FMD in South Africa. Dr Linmarie de Klerk-Lorist, a state veterinarian, discussed the dynamics of FMD in buffalo.
