#Streets of rogue mood ring series
#Streets of rogue mood ring tv

Working undercover and using hidden cameras its reporters and producers (most of whom had never worked on TV before) exposed elaborate frauds and criminal conspiracies, child trafficking, abuse of minorities and high-level political malfeasance. As a result they have often had to sit idly by while Africa’s story has been told by Western correspondents – “parachuted in” for the purpose – who reinforce stereotypical views about African peoples and their supposed inability to face up to and solve their own problems.īut to widespread acclaim Africa Investigates corrected that impression. Investigative journalism is a perilous profession in many African nations, where intimidation, threats, beatings, false imprisonment and murder can be an occupational hazard. In a world first, this hard-hitting project gave some of Africa’s best journalists the opportunity to pursue high-level investigative targets across the continent – using their unique perspective and local knowledge to put corruption, exploitation and abuse under the spotlight.Īll too often in the past, African reporters and film-makers have not been able to pursue wrongdoing because it involves powerful figures who wield undue influence over local media – financial, corporate or political – or because it is simply too dangerous.

#Streets of rogue mood ring series

In 2011, we launched a new six-part series called Africa Investigates that put flesh on Al Jazeera’s ambition to give a voice to the voiceless. Wa Afrika later sued the state for wrongful arrest and won. This came just days after we’d published a story exposing the involvement of South Africa’s chief of police in an illegal real estate deal with a friend of President Jacob Zuma. It all started with the arrest of my colleague Mzilikazi wa Afrika on August 4, 2010. In this episode of Africa Investigates, veteran South African journalists Stephan Hofstatter and Mzilikazi wa Afrika, from the country’s Sunday Times newspaper, examine the activities of one elite police unit and allegations that its members have been responsible for the torture and murder of criminal suspects.Įditor’s note: Viewers may find some of the images in this film disturbing. Elements of South Africa’s police now stand accused of being out of control in a way that is dangerously reminiscent of apartheid’s darkest days. The problem is that some of those charged with upholding the law have been breaking it themselves. This in turn has generated an increasingly aggressive response from the police – under intense political pressure to stop muggings, armed robberies, gang warfare and murder on the streets of the country’s major cities. On the birth of the Rainbow Nation two decades ago, most people believed that this would quickly become a thing of the past, that a new era of prosperity, justice and social harmony would make such abuses unthinkable.īut in the past 20 years, with both prosperity and social equality remaining an unfulfilled dream for many South Africans, violent crime has been on the rise.

Only later did it emerge that these same techniques were being used even when the victims were suspected criminals, rather than enemies of the racist state.

Under apartheid, South Africa’s police were notorious for extrajudicial killings and the routine use of torture against political dissidents.