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a new respect for the law, while we had grown up in a journalism that had no respect for the law. So all our discussion had been about how to get around the law. How can I get something into print that others don’t want you to print? So those were fantastic skills, but you need a different set of skills in a democracy. And for the media that change came overnight. We woke up one day and there were no restrictions on what we could do. Not even the normal restrictions in a democracy, because they all fell away and it took a while for new rules to develop. So we had a period of a couple of years of unbelievable freedom, where you could get away with anything.

      Ruda: Can you remember a moment when you felt, “We are stretching ourselves, we are using this freedom. This is amazing”?

      Anton: That period when we first were free was a very difficult period, because we knew we had to remake the newspaper. We thought we were ahead of the game. We thought we were closer to the zeitgeist and the rest of the media were out on the edges. We’re now at the centre of the politics. We’re no longer the alternative at the fringe. They’re now at the fringe. And we in fact started a daily newspaper. We said we can use our position to move into this market with a daily newspaper. But we were wrong. It was a terrible mistake. Because what we realised is that everyone quickly moved. All the big newspapers then quickly moved into what we considered our space.

      Ruda: So suddenly you weren’t special.

      Anton: Suddenly we weren’t special. Suddenly we were head-to-head with much bigger, more powerful newspapers that controlled all the printing and all the distribution. And the funding that had got us through the first five years of censorship disappeared, which is why many of our sister newspapers disappeared in that time.

      Ruda: Like Vrye Weekblad, the Afrikaans anti-apartheid newspaper?

      Anton: (Nods) Fortunately, we were the sole survivors. We survived, partly, by selling the newspaper to the Guardian of London. In a sense they saved us, but we lost our position as owners-editors. So I knew that we had to see through the transition, but there would be a time to move on. Time moved on, and I moved into the management of radio in Kagiso Media.

      Ruda: How is that different?

      Anton: Actually, radio is the most simple, easy medium. First, I love that. It didn’t have the complexities of print. It’s really an easy medium and it’s not complicated. It’s cheap to do and, frankly, you do a half-decent job and you can make lots of money, which was not the case in print. Not by then. But actually, quite frankly, I got bored. I had a few radio stations under me which were running well, and really it was a bit of a bore. I suppose that’s because I wasn’t made for a sort of pure management job. And then the vice chancellor at Wits called and he said, “We want to start a journalism department. Would you consider applying?” And at first I said no, because I hadn’t ever thought of doing that, and after a while I said, “Well, actually, it would be quite a nice thing to do.”

      Ruda: And having talked about the problems with young journalists coming out of universities, how have you tried to make Wits different?

      Anton: Very good question. My vision from the start was that we would do only graduate training; we would only take people who already had a degree.

      Ruda: Why?

      Anton: Because I think you should have something to say before you learn how to say it. So it was partly recognition that the demands of modern journalism mean that you should have a solid basis in the kind of training you get from a good humanities degree, or the equivalent. I mean, we had all sorts of people – with science degrees, commerce degrees – that’s great. That’s what you want. You want people who have the analytical thinking, the curiosity, the skills.

      Ruda: And who know something about the world.

      Anton: Exactly. And then you can teach them how to tell it to the world. We developed a programme which was focused on the practical. The philosophy I came with was that students would produce media from day one. They would not sit in the classroom. There was obviously classroom time, and there was work to be done in the classroom, but they would produce media under adult supervision, and that was how they would learn the craft. So I think we certainly tried to find a different balance between the practice and the theory, and it was part of a worldwide shift to what is called a hospital-school approach.

      Ruda: Where you work on the job.

      Anton: Where you work on the job and you learn on the job. So I saw that trend happen around the world and I thought we could be part of that.

      Ruda: You have also written books – like Diepsloot, about the political and social dynamics of a Johannesburg township.

      Anton: Yes, one of the things the university gave me was space to start writing again. I wrote columns, I wrote books and I contributed to a number of books. And that was me getting back to what I think my roots were.

      Ruda: That’s a journalist’s dream, to be able to do the longer version.

      Anton: Correct. To be able to take one topic, research it really thoroughly, and spend time thinking it through and writing it. And I love that, and I was about to go back to spend a year off on another project of that sort, and really looking forward to it, when I got a phone call to say, “Why don’t you come to eNCA?” And again, at first I said, “Don’t be silly, why would I do that?”

      Ruda: (Laughs) And then, why did you?

      Anton: Why did I? Because I couldn’t resist the temptation of being back in the newsroom. Once you’ve been in news, you never lose it – that passion for the big story. And when you’re not there, you’re sitting and thinking, “A big story is breaking and I could do it so much better than these bums that are doing it now!” And eNCA is at a particular place . . . It was an opportunity to learn a lot, because my television experience has been limited. And so I’m always open to doing something that’s challenging and exciting, and so they won me over.

      Ruda: And what do you want to bring to that space, to that new environment?

      Anton: Look, my passion is for good journalism. Good journalism that brings forth the ideas, the events, the people that are often ignored. You know, it’s easy to cover the big, noisy voices in our society. Finding the stuff that people don’t want you to talk about, the voices that are on the fringe of our society – that’s important. Finding a full range of South African voices is where my passion is, I think. My book really takes that on in a particular place.

      Ruda: You spent a year researching Diepsloot. How did that change you as a person? What did you learn that you didn’t know?

      Anton: Well, it took me into a world I didn’t know. I’d never been to Diepsloot. Obviously I have never lived in an informal settlement.

      Ruda: How much time did you spend there?

      Anton: I went to Diepsloot every day for about nine months. I went and I just hung out there. I went to meetings there. I interviewed people. I went drinking there. I was just there every day. I chose not to go and live there. There were times that I thought, should I come and live here? Then I thought, no, my perspective can only be an outsider trying to understand the place and I shouldn’t try to pretend it can be any other perspective – it can’t be the perspective of somebody who lives there. So you can imagine it was quite difficult going into that situation every day and then going home to suburbia and a very different family life, day after day. It actually takes quite an emotional toll.

      Ruda: And do you understand something about South Africa that you didn’t before?

      Anton: Without any doubt – and in ways that were completely unexpected for me. One of the things I had to learn, to try to understand and then explain in Diepsloot, was how cities work. I realised that I needed to understand what the city was doing and not doing, and what the blockages were to the city building more houses or building more schools or whatever it was that needed to be done. So I had to read and learn a lot about how cities work. And then I had to read an enormous amount about informal settlements around the world. And what’s immediately striking is that you read about them in Zambia or Ethiopia or Latin America or India . . . in fact they’re all very similar,

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