YEARS AGO

A shot of the National Party Cabinet walking together. “GUILTY!” is stamped across them. The portraits are interspersed with footage from Sharpeville, Soweto, Bisho. A voice-over intones: “These are the men responsible for apartheid. Would you trust them with your future? Vote ANC.”

If political advertising were to be allowed on television, we might well be confronted with such imagery come voting time next April: electioneering that is innovative, effective, manipulative … and exorbitantly expensive.

Two laws set to be approved this week, the Independent Broadcasting Authority Act and the Independent Media Commission Act, have prohibited political advertising on TV. Surprisingly, all parties agree — including the biggest potential spenders, the ANC and the NP.

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