Editorial Policy

(As of December 2022)

Values, Vision, & Mission: 

• Vuka.news is driven by a commitment to gender liberation, anti-racism, solidarity, participatory democracy, and environmental and economic justice.
• In the context of the dominance of commercialised media that prioritises elite sources and serves the information needs of the urban middle class, Vuka.news aims to  enhance media diversity, and serve the information and expression needs of the marginalised majority, enabling them to play a more active role in shaping democracy in South Africa and beyond. 
• By presenting and promoting content published by other progressive organisations we aim to harness a network effect and grow an audience far larger than any contributing site could reach alone. 

Contributing Publishers & Site Feeds 

• Vuka.news presents content from non-corporate, social justice sources that serve the information and expression needs of the marginalised majority.
• We draw content from websites of independent media and civil society organisations that share our values and publish reliable and relevant information. 
• We publish a list of contributing publishers and every article includes the publisher’s profile and contact details. 
• We are constantly looking for relevant source sites to add to Vuka.news and invite users to suggest additional sources. 
• Sites are identified and added by the Yetu moderators on an ongoing basis and ratified (or removed) at meetings of the Vuka Editorial Collective
• Once a site is selected its published content is added to relevant sections of Vuka.news using an automated process based on key-word identification. 

 Legal 

• All articles published on Vuka.news are originally published on the websites of Contributing Publishers under some form of Creative Commons licensing that allows for non-commercial reproduction. Where provided relevant licensing terms can be found on the contributing publishers website. 
• All content published on Vuka.news, including but not limited to text, images, videos, and audio clips, remain the property of the Contributing Publishers. Users of Vuka.news are permitted to view, copy, print, and distribute content for personal and non-commercial use only. Any other use, including reproduction, modification, distribution, transmission, or republication of the content on this website, should be undertaken with the prior written consent of the Contributing Publishers.
• Any unauthorized use of the content on this website may result in civil or criminal penalties.
• If you believe that copyrighted work has been reproduced on vuka.news without authorization, please contact us immediately, and we will take appropriate action.
• The relevant Contributing Publisher remains responsible for the content they publish and share. 
• Vuka.news is responsible for the content of headlines and introductions that have been edited or rewritten for the site. 

Features & Promoted Content

• The Vuka.news homepage consists of featured articles, which are in turn promoted on social media and via email. 
• Articles that are featured should include a complete copy of the original article that contains original insight and/or analysis on a topical theme
• Ideally featured articles should add to the diversity in theme or geographic location (continental, regional, national or local interest) 
• Posts that are strictly promotional, like announcement of events will not be ‘featured’, unless it includes significant background content. 
• At times Vuka.news may edit or rewrite article headings and/or introductions and/or select relevant feature images.

Moderation & Editorial Process

1. Featured and promoted content is selected by the Yetu Moderation Team that accounts to Vuka Editorial Committee at a regular meeting. 
2. Organisations contributing content are invited to join the Vuka Editorial Committee.
3. The Editorial Committee reviews the work of the Yetu moderators, assesses the sites progress, and developes editorial policies and strategies to expand the sites impact. 
4. Day-to-day decisions are made by the Yetu moderators who follow the editorial policy developed by the Editorial Committee.
5. If any publisher objects to a featured post, it will be un-featured until the editorial group moderates the objection otherwise.

Site Development

In the coming months we intend to develop the site to include (1) a calendar of events and (2) a ‘notice board’ to promote non-news related resources (3) a Feedback / Complaints button on each post to enable feedback & complaints to be shared with Contributing Publisher.