|
 On 4th October 2001, the then minister of Education, Kader Asmal, and the chariman of the Curriculum Committee, Prof Linda Chisholm, issued a media statement attacking the Pestalozzi Trust in a vicious bout of propaganda.
Strangely, the statement is now attributed to Chisholm alone in the government archives on the internet!
For years, the media statement appeared on the education department website as a media statement by Mr Asmal. Now, however, it appears only on the government webiste, as a statement by Prof Chisholm. No mention is made of Mr Asmal as the official issuing authority, as it originially was. (See http://www.info.gov.za/speeches/2001/011005146p1002.htm ) Unfortunately for Mr Asmal, the education department website at the time (which no longer exists) was captured on the Wayback Machine, an archive of internet sites going back many years. The media statement itself was archived, and so was the proof that it was issued by the Minister himself, and not by Prof Chisholm alone. The links through the wibe site can be followed to the media statements issued by the minister on 4th October 2001 at: http://web.archive.org/web/20011110041834/http://education.pwv.gov.za/ It seems as if the government is not too keen to remember that a statement like that was issued by a cabinet minister! But the good folks at the Wayback Machine keep track of these things. See the full story of this propaganda battle . |
