Pulled Film on 'paranoid' Mbeki Finally Aired

A documentary critical of South Africa's president, Thabo Mbeki, will finally be shown to the public today more than a year after it was made and after it was twice pulled from the state broadcaster amid accusations of political censorship.

The program, which portrays President Mbeki as paranoid and vindictive, will be screened at an international film festival in Durban, coinciding with an African National Congress conference.

Although Mr Mbeki yesterday opened the conference, at Midrand, north of Johannesburg, with a denial that the party leadership issue dominated the meeting, his centralizing of power and controversial free-market economic policies undoubtedly will overshadow the debates.

The documentary, commissioned and then canned by the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) and seen by the Guardian, is critical of Mr Mbeki's style of leadership.

Allister Sparks, a former editor of the Rand Daily Mail, who was interviewed for the program, said he believed that the SABC management balked at a sequence near the beginning of the film showing Nelson Mandela speaking a decade ago as he handed the ANC leadership to Mr Mbeki, seated at his side. Mr Mandela then warned his successor against abusing power. "There is a heavy responsibility for a leader elected unopposed," he said. "He may use that powerful position to settle scores with his detractors, to marginalize or get rid of them, and surround themselves with yes-men and women."

The documentary builds a picture of Mr Mbeki apparently conducting himself in the manner Mr Mandela had warned against. It describes how power was centralized under Mr Mbeki and how he isolated himself from party leaders.

The film also reports on the purge of rivals and the 2001 investigation of alleged plots to overthrow the president by some of Mr Mbeki's principal ANC rivals, including the party's former general secretary, Cyril Ramaphosa, and Tokyo Sexwale, who is running to succeed the president.

Speaking at the ANC conference yesterday, Mr Sexwale picked up on the theme. "There is a growing tendency to carry out dirty character assassinations and the dissemination of lies about other comrades. This has reached uncontrollable proportions," he said.

The SABC first declined to show the documentary a year ago and insisted on cuts.

The revised program was rescheduled for last month but pulled again. The SABC said the film was not shown as "internal procedures were not followed".

Mukoni Ratshitanga, Mr Mbeki's spokesman, declined to comment on the documentary's content but denied the presidency was involved in the decision not to broadcast.

"It is absolutely the decision of the SABC to air or not to air the documentary. We have never interfered with it."

Mr Sparks said the SABC told him it had declined to show the documentary because it was libelous. But he said he believed that the broadcaster had acted out of politically motivated self censorship, since members of its board were mostly political appointments. "This leads to bias. There are members of the board with politically laden agendas," he said. "You can only conclude that this is a political decision. I think this was an act of self-censorship."

Last year, the SABC was exposed as blacklisting critics of the government, despite public denials.