Chris Roper’s latest hit piece (“Nausea at Noddy’s lunch”, February 20) is far more than a personal assault on Independent Media chair Iqbal Survé — it is a glaring symptom of a media ecosystem that stubbornly resists transformation and wields propaganda as a weapon to crush those who threaten its entrenched power. The response is not a petty tit-for-tat rebuttal but a searing indictment of a media that masquerades bias as truth, undermining the democratic ideals it pretends to champion.
South Africa’s media landscape often mirrors its economy: a façade of progress concealing a deep-seated resistance to change. Three decades after apartheid, the mainstream media remains largely in the grip of a white conservative establishment determined to preserve its dominance at all costs.
When Survé acquired Independent Media in 2013, it signalled a rupture in this order — a black industrialist taking the reins of a major media house. Rather than being celebrated as a milestone in media diversity, his move was met with a torrent of hostility that exists to this day.
Roper’s article hinges on a foundational falsehood: that Survé “ran out of real journalists who were willing to compromise their ethics and tell his lies for him”. This is a vicious smear, devoid of evidence and steeped in contempt for the professionals at Independent Media. One is compelled to ask Roper to name the journalists who were coerced into churning out “puff pieces” on behalf of Survé. The simple truth is that he can’t, because they do not exist.
Roper’s attack then pivots to Edmond Phiri, Jamie Roz and Nonhlanhla Shezi, who he brands as puppets or fabrications. Shezi, Phiri and Roz are not staff journalists but opinion writers who are free to choose their subjects or article topics, a distinction Roper conveniently ignores. Phiri, for one, faced a Press Council hearing, which he attended virtually and in which he openly explained why his writing focused on Sekunjalo Investment Holdings. He stated that he wrote without any directive from Survé. Shezi, an independent opinion writer, wrote a piece Roper mocks without substance, failing to engage its arguments. These writers are targeted for one reason: they dared to portray Survé positively.
Roper’s playbook is as old as it is predictable. In his seminal work Propaganda Techniques, Henry Conserva observes “the oldest trick of the propagandist is to demonise and dehumanise the hated other”.
Here, Roper falsely reduces Survé to a caricature of a manipulative overlord, intent on controlling the narrative at any cost. Yet, in doing so, he mirrors the very tactics he accuses Survé of employing, while stripping credibility from anyone perceived to be defending him. Roper is not conducting journalism, but propaganda smear and a calculated assassination of Survé’s character.
The irony of Roper’s assault is palpable. He accuses Survé of orchestrating propaganda, while his own piece reeks of it. Dismissing Shezi’s article as “bootlicking nonsense” without engaging its arguments is little more than a classic deflection. Independent Media does not micromanage its opinion writers.
One wonders: are Roper’s relentless hit pieces commissioned by the media barons whose interests he serves? Roper’s conspicuous silence on the influence wielded by his own employers reveals a double standard. Every move made by Survé is scrutinised, while other mainstream media owners are conveniently left unexamined.
Survé’s meteoric rise in business is a journey of defiance. Without bowing to the patronage networks that define South African business, he built a business empire spanning media, technology and fisheries. His acquisition of Independent Media was not a gift from the establishment but a hard-won prize that unsettled the comfortable hierarchies of the past.
Surve’s sin is his independence: a black industrialist thriving outside the established business factions that prop up the status quo. Survé’s success is a provocation the old guard cannot stomach.
Survé is the mirror reflecting an industry deeply unwilling to transform and evolve
While South Africa’s media fixates on tearing him down, the international community recognises his accomplishments. His former position as chair of the Brics Business Council and accolades from esteemed institutions in Europe and the Nordic countries affirm his stature — credentials no baseless smear can erase.
Roper’s obsession with mocking Survé’s presence at Davos, portraying it as self-aggrandisement, ultimately reveals more about his own insecurities. A South African commanding global influence without political office threatens the narrative of a media elite that prefers its icons tethered to familiar power structures.
Roper closes his diatribe with a sanctimonious flourish: “We care about this because it’s an example of how bad actors use media to craft narratives that are counter to reality.” Who is this “we”? A self-appointed cabal of media gatekeepers anointing themselves arbiters of truth? The real bad actor is the journalist who wields his pen like a weapon, crafting vindictive screeds to demolish a man’s reputation while cloaking it as noble critique.
Survé is not the villain here. Instead, he is the mirror reflecting an industry deeply unwilling to transform and evolve. Roper’s article shows that it is time for South African journalism to face its reckoning — not through petty sniping, but through a ruthless examination of its inherent systemic biases and a commitment to the diversity it claims to value. Anything less is a betrayal of the public it serves.
Senekal de Wet is executive editor of Independent Media
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