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Dear friends and fellow South Africans,

How do you know me? Let me count the ways; you know me from The Star as "a
dictator", from the Business Day as a "violent man", from The Daily News as
clinging to power, from The Witness as "emotional" in the face of an
"anti-Shenge rebellion", from The Sowetan as the "grizzled" and "vulnerable"
leader of a "moribund party", from The Citizen as a "stumbling block" to
progress, from The Mercury as comparable to Mugabe and Malema, and from the
City Press as neglectful of my family.

These are the attributes that have been laid at my door by the media in the
last few weeks. It would be difficult not to take it personally, as the
attacks have certainly become personal. They have hurt members of my family
more deeply than they have hurt my own feelings. My pain is that this kind
of gutter journalism hurts my family.

I was appalled by the City Press article this weekend alleging that my
family is locked in a feud over my grandson, allegedly because I spend my
time fighting for my political career at the expense of my family. Besides
being utterly untrue, it is insulting to have a journalist write so freely
about the internal dynamics of my family as though he knows us or anything
about us.

Quoting what is called "a member of the family" on the basis of anonymity is
cruel to all members of my family who are then tarred with the same brush as
though they have discussed me and issues concerning the family with the
media. But the journalist concerned and the newspaper that published his
calumny have had a running vendetta against me and the IFP for several
decades.

With the media, it is really a case of damned if you do and damned if you
don't. Whenever I or any IFP leader responds to misrepresentations, we have
to fight, usually unsuccessfully, to be published. We have a right to reply,
particularly when lies are published which damage our reputation in the
public arena. But even when we bring matters of public interest to the
attention of journalists, the information is simply ignored. This problem is
somehow worse among our Zulu newspapers where brown envelope journalism
rules the day.

It is good for our media to expose corruption in the public life of South
Africa, particularly that which involves us as public representatives.
However, the exposé of what went on in the Western Cape involving a
Political Editor and a Premier has highlighted what I mentioned to Sir
Anthony O'Reilly, the owner of Independent Newspapers, about what is going
on in some of these newspapers. The Mail & Guardian drew attention to these
journalists' shenanigans earlier this year. The media needs to be
introspective in order that they should retain their credibility when they
write about corruption.

While we have to fight to be heard, if I fail to speak on an issue, all hell
breaks loose. The Mercury and Ilanga have claimed that President Zuma asked
me to step down from the Presidency of the IFP, and they allege this made me
angry. Where they conjured up this, is beyond me. My meeting with President
Zuma was a private discussion and neither I nor the President's office is
prepared to publicise the contents of our discussion.

The discussion we had was amicable from beginning to end. Even when we
disagreed on some aspects of the matters we discussed, we did so without
being disagreeable. It is grossly irresponsible for a journalist to suck
from his thumb that I was angry with the President, when that never occurred
at any stage of our discussions. I am not going to break confidence at this
stage.

Apparently that annoys the media, as the IFP has now received a threat that
one Editor of a certain newspaper will stop publishing any of our letters
unless I give them an exclusive interview. This far oversteps the bounds of
ethical journalism and is nothing less than abuse of power.

It is within the media's power to shape public opinion, whether that is done
through repeated small slip ups - like the Financial Mail and others
claiming that I unilaterally decided to postpone the IFP's conference - or
through quoting the so-called "analysts" that routinely make baseless
statements. Some of these analysts have been well-known activists of the
ruling Party for several decades.

When a leading and prestigious magazine such as the Financial Mail writes
that I postponed the conference, anyone reading this would not be blamed for
thinking that I decide things unilaterally in the IFP, not as a member of
the structures of the Party in which I serve like anyone else. This decision
was taken collectively by our National Council, not by me.

The idea is to portray me as some kind of dictator. This constantly reminds
me of how well Dr Anthea Jeffrey exposes how the media treated me and the
IFP during the low intensity civil war that cost us 20,000 black lives. But
all these things do not diminish the respect I have for the role our media
played during the apartheid era, when our media spoke so eloquently for the
downtrodden and oppressed.

But one would never believe that this is the same media that gave me such
accolades during that era. In 1973, I was awarded by the South African
Society of Journalists the accolade "Newsmaker of the Year". In 1985, the
Pretoria Press Club likewise awarded me the accolade of "Newsmaker of the
Year". In 1986, the Financial Mail declared me "The Financial Mail's Man of
the Year". Not even the current concerted vilification of me can wipe away
that history!

But the so-called analysts continue to make their baseless statements. Take
for instance the absurd remark that traditionalists finally have a leader
they can identify with, because of President Zuma's polygamy, when I have
been an Inkosi for more than half a century and have been the Chairperson of
the House of Traditional Leaders in KwaZulu Natal and am still the
Chairperson of the Zululand District Local House of Traditional Leaders.
These are not positions I simply gave myself. They were bestowed by these
same "traditionalists".

This week, the Cape Argus and The Post purportedly quote from one of my
online newsletters. But try as I might, I cannot find a newsletter or even a
speech in which I penned those words. It is not the substance of what they
claim I said that is the problem, but the fact that words can so casually be
put in my mouth.

One favourite way of putting words in my mouth is through cartoon
caricatures. I have had more space on the cartoons page of Isolezwe this
year than any other public figure, and a new series of cartoons mocking me
and the Party has just been launched. There is no denying that I have been
singled out as Isolezwe's target for ridicule. But the Press Ombudsman has
dismissed our complaints on this matter.

For all its bark, the Press Ombudsman seems to have no bite. This leaves
public figures without any form of protection from unscrupulous newsmen, and
forces us to turn to legal action whenever we need to set the record
straight. When I decide to do so, some in the same media complain that
Buthelezi is the most litigious politician in South Africa. What choice do I
have in these circumstances?

But legal action is time consuming and costly, and should not be necessary
in our democratic dispensation where rights are so comprehensively enshrined
in the Constitution.

It seems every paper is intent on blackening my name. But if I dare rise in
protest, I will no doubt be called reactionary, a curmudgeon or
self-obsessed. How can anyone win this war with the media? I thank God that
there are still people who know me, not from what they read in the papers,
but from what they have seen and heard and experienced throughout my 57
years in politics.

No matter how many detractors I accumulate, my friends remind me to press
forward.

Yours in the service of the nation,