Kunene website ‘tabloid at best’
CONTROVERSIAL businessman Kenny Kunene’s online news website‚ the Weekly Xposé‚ is a “tabloid at best”.
That is how Judge Raylene Keightley described it in the Johannesburg High Court yesterday.
The website published graphic sexual videos which a woman allegedly sent to Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa‚ who is not in the videos.
The website blurred out the woman in the videos‚ but published her name‚ age and where she lives.
She applied on Monday for an interdict to remove the two videos on the website and prevent further publications in the future.
Advocate Garth Hulley SC‚ representing Kunene‚ argued that the videos were in the public interest‚ because of the link to Ramaphosa.
Keightley said the woman was not a celebrity or public figure. Hulley argued further that without the videos the article “might as well not exist” on a website he said was often deemed “fake news”.
Keightley said she was concerned the first step was to publish the videos.
She said there might have been a motivation for publishing them if Ramaphosa and the woman had denied the article and the website wanted to disprove this.
Advocate Tshifhiwa Mabuda‚ representing the applicant‚ said publishing the videos and blurring out her identity was a contradiction‚ because the article identified her age and where she lived.
The Sunday Independent‚ which published allegations of Ramaphosa’s affairs two weeks ago‚ said it would not publish any more pictures or videos relating to the alleged sex scandal.
But editor Steven Motale said the newspaper would use “all material in our possession” to continue with stories into Ramaphosa’s alleged extramarital affairs.