Apology and retraction

One of our freelance reporters fabricated quotes

GroundUp has retracted two articles and will review 16 others by freelance reporter Sibusiso Mdlalose who was covering stories from Newcastle.

By GroundUp Editors

28 January 2020

It came to our attention on 27 January that a freelance reporter, Sibusiso Mdlalose, made up quotes from the Newcastle municipality and KwaZulu-Natal police in a story we published on 24 January.

We have retracted the story and informed Mdlalose that he will not write for us again. We have also retracted another story he wrote last year. We will conduct a review of the other 16 stories he has written for GroundUp since October 2018.

We will examine our systems to see how to reduce the likelihood of this happening in the future.

We apologise to our readers that these stories misled them. We also apologise to the Newcastle municipality and the KwaZulu-Natal police that our articles quoted them saying things that they did not say.

These are the links to the two stories we have retracted:

• https://www.groundup.org.za/article/im-still-shaking-fear-i-thank-god-im-still-alive-says-newcastle-shop-owner/
• https://www.groundup.org.za/article/dozens-toilets-gather-dust-newcastle-municipality-fails-complete-project/

Issued by Nathan Geffen
GroundUp Editor