R2K Statement: Time to end the surveillance abuses – Fix RICA now!

The Right2Know Campaign is outraged by the revelation that another journalist has been spied on – on Friday the Mail&Guardian revealed that the CEO of a public agency illegally accessed the phone records of reporter Athandiwe Saba, allegedly through the use of a Private Investigator and a phony surveillance warrant.

This is the latest addition to mounting evidence of surveillance abuses which have targeted journalists, whistleblowers, activists and members of the broader public.

These abuses are enabled by the law called RICA, which has subjected every SIM card owner to a system of surveillance that is ripe for abuse, with weak oversight and faulty protections.

This same surveillance law now faces a legal challenge to its constitutionality, brought by amaBhungane Centre for Investigative Journalism after a previous case of surveillance against journalist Sam Sole. R2K today announces its intention to join that court case as a friend of the court.

We want to see RICA completely overhauled to ensure basic protections for ordinary citizens, journalists, whistleblowers and activists. We want to bring an end to this kind of abuse.

Issued at R2K’s 2018 National Summit.