Sunday Times (South Africa)

Last updated

Sunday Times
Type Weekly newspaper
Format Broadsheet
Owner(s) Arena Holdings
EditorS'thembiso Msomi
Founded1906
LanguageEnglish
Headquarters Johannesburg
Circulation 442,018 weekly
Readership3,436,000
Sister newspapers
Website sundaytimes.co.za

The Sunday Times is South Africa's biggest Sunday newspaper. Established in 1906, it is distributed throughout South Africa and in neighbouring countries such as Lesotho, Botswana, and Eswatini.

Contents

History

The Sunday Times was first published on 4 February 1906 as a weekly sister publication of the Rand Daily Mail which at the time was "standing alone" against its rival, the Transvaal Leader.

Founding editor George Herbert Kingswell introduced the slogan "A Paper for the People". [1] It was later changed to "The Paper for the People", a slogan that is still in use today. For the first edition of the paper, published on 4 February 1906, [1] 11,600 copies were printed and soon sold out, forcing the paper to print an additional 5000 copies. By November 1909, the paper sales had risen to 35,000.

In 1992, the former columnist Jani Allan sued the British broadcaster Channel 4 for libel over affair allegations involving her and Eugene Terre'Blanche. [2] Allan had interviewed the AWB leader for the Sunday Times. [3] Allan had already settled out of court with the London Evening Standard and Options magazine over similar allegations. [4] The then-news editor of the newspaper, the late Marlene Burger [5] and newspaper astrologer Linda Shaw [6] testified against Allan. Before the libel suit, Allan had published articles for the newspaper dismissing the affair allegations. [7] Allan also allowed the newspaper to publish answerphone messages left by Terre'Blanche as well as her threats of taking legal action against Terre'Blanche for nuisance contact. [8] Allan lost the case; the judge ruled that she had not been defamed but did not conclude whether an affair had occurred. [9] The case became notorious for violence and a dirty tricks campaign. [10] [11] Publications such as the Financial Mail and Allan herself speculated that the De Klerk government paid the defence witnesses in an attempt to destabilise the far-right in South Africa. [12] Shaw recounted her editor, Ken Owen's reaction to the case: "When I came back from London. Owen stood in the middle of the newsroom and said: 'You have single-handedly destroyed the reputation of every journalist in the country and we have become the laughing stock." [13]

On 13 November 2005, the Sunday Times broke the story that the African National Congress (ANC) leader Jacob Zuma was being investigated on rape charges. It was reported that Zuma considered legal action against the publication, although it later emerged that an investigation was underway. On 6 December 2005, official rape charges were filed against Zuma. He would later be acquitted of rape.

On 5 November 2007, it was reported that a consortium containing some senior government figures had launched a bid to purchase 100% of Avusa (previously Johncom), the company that owned the Sunday Times. [14]

In March 2007, Zuma sued the paper for R6 million over two columns by popular columnist David Bullard. The two columns, Stupidity a mitigating circumstance for Zuma, published on 16 April 2006, and Visit the Zuma website to see what was meant (7 May 2006), were cited by Zuma as defamatory and an "impairment of his dignity". [15] Although David Bullard was found to be operating within the ethical bounds of The Sunday Times regarding the two columns, he would later fall out of favour with editor Mondli Makhanya.

On 10 April 2008, Bullard was fired from the Sunday Times after the publication of a column on 6 April 2008 (Uncolonised Africa wouldn't know what it was missing) received a stern protest from several political parties. The editor apologised for the column, saying "by publishing him (Bullard) we were complicit in disseminating his Stone Age philosophies". [16]

In September 2008, the Sunday Times was again vigorously attacked for publishing a highly controversial piece, this time in the form of a cartoon by critically acclaimed cartoonist Jonathon Shapiro (Zapiro). The cartoon depicted Jacob Zuma getting ready to rape the Justice System while being assisted by the leaders of various ANC and political factions and parties. Zapiro denied any ambiguity between Jacob Zuma's depiction as a rapist in the cartoon and his earlier rape trial.[ citation needed ] the Sunday Times and its editor were slated by various ANC officials. A joint press release by the ANC, the South African Communist Party and the ANC Youth League lambasted the Sunday Times editor, describing him as a dictator, and called for his replacement: "We can only hope that the newspaper will find a suitable leadership other than the ranting dictator who finds joy in manipulating the truth." [17]

In 2015, veteran journalist John Matisonn alleged in his book, "God, Spies and Lies: Finding South Africa's Future Through its Past", that the former editor of the newspaper, Tertius Myburgh, was an apartheid-era spy. [18] In the same year, Jani Allan supported the allegations made against her former editor in an opinion piece published by the Daily Maverick . [19]

Editors

1906–1909: Founding editor George Herbert Kingswell launched the Sunday Times and Rand Daily Mail for owner Sir Abe Bailey. Kingswell was initially offered the job at The Rand Daily Mail (The Fourth Estate, Joel Mervis), but instead looked to create a weekly paper.

1909–1910: Lewis Rose Macleod named editor.

1910–1942': Joseph Langley Levy, a drama critic and leading cultural figure in Johannesburg, was born in Liverpool, England, on 25 May 1887. He was editor of the Sunday Times for 32 years, during which time circulation rose from 35,000 to 150,000, penetrating every province and reaching towns and villages scattered over an area of almost half a million square miles. He died in Johannesburg on 11 May 1945.

1942–1947': E.B 'Chook' Dawson is remembered as the first of the paper's 'shirtsleeves editors', a journalist who hated ostentation in either people or prose. At the time of his death in 1957, he was also remembered as a hero of Delville Wood who saved a comrade's life during the epic battle in World War I.

1947–1958: N. A. G. Caley named editor

1959–1975: Joel Mervis, as editor of the Sunday Times, is credited with transforming it into the most widely read and powerful weekly in South Africa.

1975–1990: Albert Tertius Myburgh (26 December 1936 – 2 December 1990) was a South African journalist and editor, best known as editor of the Sunday Times. Myburgh resigned as editor of the Sunday Times in September 1990 after 15 years. His next role was to be an ambassador to Washington or London. Four days later, he was diagnosed with terminal cancer and died at home in December of the same year.

1991–1996: Ken Owen named editor.

1996–1998: Brian Pottinger was also the deputy chair of the South African National Editor's Forum during this time. He became the managing director of Times Newspapers Limited and, in 2000, would be appointed as publisher of the Sunday Times. From 2003 to 2007, he was the chief executive officer of the Africa Division for Johnnic Communications Limited.

1998–2000: Mike Robertson was the editor and associate publisher for the Sunday Times during this period. He was the deputy editor, chief assistant editor, assistant editor, and political correspondent for the newspaper. He is the publisher of the Sunday Times and managing director of Times Media Group's media operations.

2002–2003: Mathatha Tsedu was the deputy editor of the Sunday Independent, the deputy editor of the Star, then the Deputy Chief executive of the SABC news before becoming editor of the Sunday Times in 2002. In 2003, he was dismissed as editor of the Sunday Times. In 2014, the SA National Editors' Forum announced that Mathatha Tsedu would serve as its executive director.

2004–2010: Mondli Makhanya was appointed as editor of Sunday Times. A political writer and editor, he became the Mail & Guardian editor in 2002 before joining the Sunday Times in 2004. In 2010, Makhanya was promoted to editor-in-chief of Avusa Media newspapers (including The Times and Sowetan, Sunday World).

2010–2013: Ray Hartley was the founding editor of the daily newspaper The Times in 2007 before taking over the reins as Editor of the Sunday Times in 2010 after Makhanya left. During Hartley's tenure as editor, Sunday Times journalists won virtually all the awards on offer, including the prestigious Standard Bank Sivukile and Taco Kuiper awards for investigative journalism. He is currently an editor at large for the Times Media Group and launched the Rand Daily Mail website in 2014.

2013–2015: Phylicia Oppelt became the first female editor of the Sunday Times. Oppelt was the editor of the Daily Dispatch from 2005 to 2008 and the editor of Business Times from 2008 to 2010. In 2010, she was appointed editor of The Times, which had entered the market in June 2007 under Hartley's editorship.

2016–2020: Bongani Siqoko is the former editor of the award-winning Daily Dispatch, Saturday Dispatch and DispatchLIVE. He has been with the Daily Dispatch since November 2004, having held many positions at the newspaper – news editor, managing editor, and deputy editor – before he was appointed editor in June 2013. He holds an MA in International Journalism from City University London, United Kingdom.

2020 to present: S'thembiso Msomi became the new editor in the first quarter of 2020. Msomi has 24 years of journalism experience and was editor of the Sowetan for two years before his most recent appointment. Msomi returns to the Sunday Times as he was previously deputy editor. He also held the position of political editor of the Sunday Times and City Press. He is the author of the unauthorised biography of the previous DA leader, Mmusi Maimane. [20]

Bibliography

Distribution areas

Distribution [21]
20082018
Eastern CapeYY
Free StateYY
GautengYY
Kwa-Zulu NatalYY
LimpopoYY
MpumalangaYY
North WestYY
Northern CapeYY
Western CapeYY

Distribution figures

Circulation [22]
Net Sales
Oct – 12 Dec449 799
Jul – 12 Sep451 676
Apr – 12 Jun452 785
Jan – 12 Mar455 129

Readership figures

Estimated Readership [23] [24]
AIR
12 Jan – 12 Dec3 411 000
11 Jul – 12 Jun3 688 000

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging</span> South African neo-Nazi political party

The Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging, meaning "Afrikaner Resistance Movement", commonly known by its abbreviation AWB, is an Afrikaner nationalist, neo-Nazi political party in South Africa. Since its founding in 1973 by Eugène Terre'Blanche and six other far-right Afrikaners, it has been dedicated to secessionist Afrikaner nationalism and the creation of an independent Boer-Afrikaner republic or "Volkstaat/Boerestaat" in part of South Africa. During bilateral negotiations to end apartheid in the early 1990s, the organisation terrorised and killed black South Africans.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eugène Terre'Blanche</span> Afrikaner nationalist (1941–2010)

Eugène Ney Terre'Blanche was an Afrikaner nationalist who founded and led the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging. Prior to founding the AWB, he served as a South African Police officer, was a farmer, and was an unsuccessful Herstigte Nasionale Party candidate for local office in the Transvaal. He was a major figure in the right-wing backlash against the collapse of apartheid. His beliefs and philosophy have continued to be influential amongst white supremacists in South Africa and across the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jacob Zuma</span> President of South Africa from 2009 to 2018

Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma is a South African politician who served as the fourth president of South Africa from 2009 to 2018. He is also referred to by his initials JZ and clan names Nxamalala and Msholozi. Zuma was a former anti-apartheid activist, member of uMkhonto we Sizwe, and president of the African National Congress (ANC) from 2007 to 2017.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma</span> South African politician (born 1949)

Nkosazana Clarice Dlamini-Zuma, sometimes referred to by her initials NDZ, is a South African politician, medical doctor and former anti-apartheid activist. A longstanding member of the African National Congress (ANC), she currently serves as Minister in the Presidency responsible for Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities and is the Chancellor of the University of Limpopo.

The Mail & Guardian, formerly the Weekly Mail, is a South African weekly newspaper and website, published by M&G Media in Johannesburg, South Africa. It focuses on political analysis, investigative reporting, Southern African news, local arts, music and popular culture. It is considered a newspaper of record for South Africa.

The Leader, His Driver and the Driver's Wife is a 1991 British feature-length documentary film set during the final days of apartheid in South Africa, particularly centring on Eugène Terre'Blanche, founder and leader of the far-right Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB). The film was directed by Nick Broomfield and first shown in 1991. It received an average of 2.3 million viewers during its screening on Channel 4. A year later it was the subject of legal action brought by the journalist, Jani Allan, in what was described as "the libel case of the summer". In 2006, Broomfield released a follow-up, His Big White Self.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">947 (radio station)</span> South African radio station

947 is a radio station that broadcasts on the 94.7FM frequency from Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa.

<i>Cape Times</i> Newspaper from Cape Town, South Africa

The Cape Times is an English-language morning newspaper owned by Independent News & Media SA and published in Cape Town, South Africa.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kgalema Motlanthe</span> President of South Africa from 2008 to 2009

Kgalema Petrus Motlanthe is a South African politician who served as the third president of South Africa from 25 September 2008 to 9 May 2009, following the resignation of Thabo Mbeki. Thereafter, he was deputy president under Jacob Zuma from 9 May 2009 to 26 May 2014.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jani Allan</span> South African journalist, columnist, writer and broadcaster (1952–2023)

Jani Allan was a South African journalist, columnist, writer, broadcaster, and a media celebrity.

<i>City Press</i> (South Africa) South African newspaper

City Press is a South African news brand that publishes on multiple platforms. Its flagship print edition is distributed nationally on Sunday, and it has a daily newsletter, online platform, and other social media platforms. These include Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mondli Makhanya</span>

Mondli Makhanya is a South African journalist who has been editor-in-chief of City Press since 2016. He was formerly the editor of the Mail & Guardian from 2002 to 2003, the editor of the Sunday Times from 2004 to 2010, and the editor-in-chief at the Times Media Group from 2010 to 2013. He is also a former chairperson of the South African National Editors' Forum. He is well known for his political commentary, currently published in City Press columns.

David Bullard is a British-born and South African naturalized columnist, author, TV presenter and celebrity public speaker known for his controversial satire and sharp wit.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zweli Mkhize</span> South African doctor and politician

Zwelini Lawrence Mkhize is a South African medical doctor and politician who served as the Minister of Health from May 2019 until his resignation on 5 August 2021. He previously served as the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs from 2018 to 2019. Before that, he was the fifth Premier of KwaZulu-Natal from 2009 to 2013.

<i>Face Value</i> (book)

Face Value is a 1983 anthology of collected journalism by South African journalist Jani Allan. The book is compiled from selections of Allan's successful gossip and popular culture column Just Jani that appeared in the Sunday Times. She was voted "the most admired person in South Africa." in a Gallup poll commissioned by the newspaper. The book was published by Longstreet publishers in Cape Town and released in South Africa in 1983.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Mashatile</span> Deputy President of South Africa since 2023

Paul Shipokosa Mashatile is a South African politician who is the 9th Deputy President of South Africa. He became Deputy President of the governing African National Congress (ANC) in December 2022. Before his election to that position, he was ANC Treasurer-General from December 2017 and acting ANC Secretary-General from January 2022.

<i>The New Age</i> (South African newspaper) 2010–2018 newspaper

The New Age newspaper was a South African national daily newspaper, owned and operated by TNA Media (Pty) Ltd. It was established in June 2010 with its first publication on 6 December 2010. It was later re-branded as Afro Voice in April 2018. Its last edition was published on 29 June 2018.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ace Magashule</span> South African politician and activist

Elias Sekgobelo "Ace" Magashule is a South African politician and former anti-apartheid activist who served as the Secretary General of the African National Congress (ANC), South Africa's governing party, between December 2017 and his suspension on 3 May 2021. He served as the Premier of the Free State, one of South Africa's nine provinces, from 2009 until 2018, and was known to be influential in the ANC of his home province.

<i>Jani Confidential</i>

Jani Confidential is a memoir by the late South African columnist Jani Allan, once the most famous media figure in the country as a columnist for the country's mass-circulation Sunday Times. Allan charts her rise in South African journalism against the backdrop of excess and decadence of the country's white elites. Allan's life unravels when an interview with the late Eugene Terre'Blanche threatens to derail her glittering career. Her memoir became a critical success, lauded by publications such as the Daily Maverick, Mail & Guardian and Noseweek. Commercially Jani Confidential also performed well, becoming a Sunday Times top five best-seller. The memoir was published by Jacana Media on 16 March 2015.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams</span> South African politician

Stella Tembisa Ndabeni-Abrahams is a South African politician who is currently serving as the Minister of Small Business Development since 5 August 2021. She previously served as Minister of Communications and Digital Technologies from November 2018 to August 2021. She is a member of the National Executive Committee (NEC) and a National Working Committee (NWC) of the African National Congress (ANC).

References

  1. 1 2 Rosenthal, Eric (1961). Encyclopedia of Southern Africa. Internet Archive. Frederick Warne & Co. Ltd. p. 558.
  2. ↑ "Channel 4 sued", The Independent , 21 July 1992.
  3. ↑ Wren, Christopher S. (7 October 1990). "Rumblings on the Right". The New York Times .
  4. ↑ "Jani Allan fights on despite 300,000 pounds libel costs", The Independent, 6 August 1992.
  5. ↑ "Marlene Burger: Legendary news editor", Sunday Times, 3 May 2009. Archived 11 May 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  6. ↑ "Courtroom 14: the Owl has landed", The Independent, 25 July 1992.
  7. ↑ Allan, Jani, "The REAL story of me and ET and the SAP", Sunday Times, 2 January 1989, p. 1.
  8. ↑ Terre Blanche scandal: "Darlinkie" phone plea claim. The Times , 31 July 1989.
  9. ↑ "Century of Sundays". Carte Blanche (TV series). 3 May 2006. Archived from the original on 27 September 2006.
  10. ↑ "Jani Allan Libel Case: Shadow of violence hung over trial", The Independent, 6 August 1992
  11. ↑ Nick Cohen, David Connett and Chris McGreal, "Four dirty tricks they played during the Jani Allan case: Nick Cohen and David Connett in London and Chris McGreal in Johannesburg peer into the murky background surrounding last week's Jani Allan libel case", The Independent, 9 August 1992.
  12. ↑ [Leading article]. Financial Mail, 6 August 1992.
  13. ↑ Dreyer, Nadine. A Century of Sundays: 100 Years of Breaking News in the Sunday Times, 1906–2006. Zebra.
  14. ↑ Chris McGreal, "Mbeki allies attempt to buy paper hostile to president", The Guardian, 5 November 2007.
  15. ↑ Shanthini Naidoo, "Zuma Sues for R6m for 'Stupid, Dishonest' Slur", Sunday Times, 1 April 2007 (via The Arms Deal Virtual Press Office).
  16. ↑ The Times. Archived 22 June 2008 at the Wayback Machine
  17. ↑ Official ANC Web page. Archived 20 May 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  18. ↑ Top editor 'was an apartheid spy' IOL. 29 November 2015
  19. ↑ An open letter to Daddy dearest, Tertius Myburgh Daily Maverick. 4 December 2015
  20. ↑ Reporter, T. M. O. (12 February 2020). "S'thembiso Msomi new editor of the Sunday Times". The Media Online. Retrieved 24 May 2020.
  21. ↑ "Sunday Times Website" . Retrieved 20 March 2013.
  22. ↑ Audit Bureau of Circulations (S.A)
  23. ↑ SAARF AMPS (Previous Presentations)
  24. ↑ SAARF AMPS (Industry Presentations)
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.