The Sowetan

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The Sowetan (German: "Der Sowetoer") is an English-language , South African daily newspaper that appears in Johannesburg and is distributed nationwide. It is named after the former township of Soweto .

history

From around 1980, The Sowetan was distributed free of charge to the black population in urban centers of South Africa, especially around Johannesburg, by the Argus Publishing Company . At first the newspaper appeared only on Saturdays and Sundays, then only on Saturdays. The circulation was around 120,000.

After the Johannesburg daily newspapers Post Transvaal ( Post for short ) and Sunday Post , which were published by the same publisher, had been banned, the title The Sowetan was chosen as the successor title . The newspaper first appeared as a daily newspaper on February 1, 1981 and quickly became the mouthpiece of blacks, their lifestyle and their opposition to apartheid .

The first editor-in-chief was Percy Qoboza , who had already led the Post Transvaal but was soon replaced by Joe Latakgomo . After receiving death threats, Latakgomo joined the star in 1988 . Aggrey Klaaste was editor-in-chief until 2002 . As early as 1988 he introduced the motto Building the Nation (for example: " Forming the nation "), which was later replaced by Power your Future (for example: "Make your future strong").

After the end of apartheid, the newspaper became the property of New Africa Investments Ltd. (NAIL), of which Klaaste became a board member in 2002; around 2012 she came to the Times Media Group (since 2017 Tiso Blackstar Group ). In 2010 the news portal SowetanLive was revised and restarted.

Structure, orientation and edition

The newspaper is based in Rosebank, a suburb of Johannesburg. Editor-in-chief is S'thembiso Msomi (as of 2018). Politically, the paper is more on the left and is independent.

In 2013, an average of 98,258 copies were sold per day, with 1.646 million readers.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Mentioned in 1980 at sahistory.org.za (English), accessed on June 3, 2016
  2. ↑ a b Sowetan, a black weekly paper to publish daily in South Africa. New York Times, January 27, 1981, accessed June 3, 2016
  3. ↑ Article on the 25th anniversary of the foundation , accessed on June 3, 2016
  4. ^ Aggrey Klaaste - still building the nation. ( Memento from May 30, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) 2003 report at joburg.co.za (English)
  5. ↑ SowetanLive ( Memento from July 3, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) at timesmedia.co.za (English)
  6. ^ New editors for Sunday World, Sowetan. marklives.com (English), accessed March 9, 2019
  7. ↑ South African newspapers ( Memento from April 26, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) (English)