The 2025 World Press Freedom Index, released in early May 2025 by Reporters Without Borders, shows the decline in media freedom in many parts of the world. This is worrying not only because there are negative implications for human rights-related matters, but also because corruption operates best when the media is not allowed to act as a watchdog.
The impact of artificial intelligence (AI) in media work and for press freedom was the theme of the 2025 World Press Freedom Day, commemorated on 3 May. Discussions on the day focused on the benefits and the risks of using AI, keeping the non-negotiable principle of human rights always in view.
Public sector anti-corruption initiatives must take into account that it’s not only standard operating procedures, manuals, and codes of conduct that matter, but also the unwritten informal rules that control and shape behaviour behind the scenes. This is the view of the Corruption, Justice and Literacy Program which, in a recent report, aims to address a burning question – “Why have decades of efforts to address civil service corruption yielded little lasting change?”
The Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Leadership (Cogta) is reviewing the 1998 White Paper on Local Government to evaluate its impact, tackle challenges, and align local governance with modern realities. Accordingly, the department invites the public, civil society, public institutions, interested stakeholders, and all three spheres of government to provide comments on any aspect of local government – even beyond the specific topics outlined in the discussion document. The deadline is 30 June 2025.
Update: The Free State High Court has granted Ace Magashule’s former personal assistant Moroadi Cholota the opportunity to challenge the jurisdiction of the court as it pertains to her case, as well as the legality of her extradition from the United States to face trial in South Africa. She was extradited in August last year and has maintained that South African courts cannot try her due to the manner in which she was brought back. The case has been postponed to June.
South African taxpayers have forked out an estimated R521-billion over the last 15 years to keep state owned enterprises alive, and have received nothing in return. Despite the bailouts, many companies continue to fail due to financial mismanagement and corruption, and the bailouts may be much higher than the National Treasury estimates.
The Parliamentary Monitoring Group recently unveiled its latest digital tool, the ParliMeter. The platform uses open data sourced from Parliament to help residents and parliamentarians alike by improving access to information, enhancing transparency and therefore monitoring capabilities, and empowering civil society and residents to hold their elected representatives accountable.
We need more young people in the fight for accountability in the public sector, and for that to happen, they need to know what this accountability looks like, writes Moepeng Valencia Talane for CW Voices. Accordingly, Corruption Watch’s Strengthening Action Against Corruption project, based in the Eastern Cape, recently trained young activists in advocacy work, communications, and media, and how to hold each other accountable as part of the project’s Youth Ambassador for Accountability (YAfA) programme.
Extreme wealth is a threat to democracy, says the Tax Justice Network – and it is not alone in this view. The organisation is one of several voices calling for an extreme wealth tax to be imposed worldwide on the super-rich. This would not only help to address wealth inequality but also have spillover positive effects on crimes such as money laundering, drug trafficking, and corruption, through the simultaneous enforcement of beneficial ownership transparency.