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The online media coverage often serves as the primary source of information for the public regarding their everyday lives, correctional centres included, even though these institutions are isolated from the general public. Nevertheless, the individual’s perceptions are largely influenced by online media portrayals of correctional centres. Using the non-empirical research design: Systematic review, with the objective of t exploring the portrayal of South African female prison (correctional centre) life through the use of ‘News24 and YouTube online media platforms,’ aided by ‘eNews Channel Africa (eNCA), Newzroom Afrika, South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) News and Crime Watch.’ This study employed qualitative research approach. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) was adopted to analyse the purposively selected studies, supported by the inductive Thematic Content Analysis (TCA) to identify, code, and interpret recurring study themes and patterns from this subject. The study findings indicate that the online media platforms construct a dualistic image of female prison (correctional centre) life, often oscillating between depictions of brutality and too lenient, resulting in mixed perceptions which may complicates the public's understanding of female incarceration. It is recommended that the online media organisations should strengthen ethical standards relating to the coverage of correctional centres and inmates, including avoiding dehumanising descriptions that can stigmatise incarcerated women and deter reintegration.

This paper examined South African politicians' (re)presentation in Tony Leon’s regular column, On the contrary, which appeared in The Times newspaper from 2012 to 2017. This period in South African politics is made interesting by the fact that it coincides with the time when there was mounting pressure for the then president, Jacob Zuma, of the ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC), to step down, especially between 7 January 2015 and 21 March 2017. Tony Leon, who also once served as a councilor for the Democratic Party (DA), one of the major opposition parties in South Africa is the columnist who at the time authors the on the contrary column. This creates interesting research on how the columnist and the newspaper are able or not to maintain ethical journalism. In conducting the study, this article employs the framing theory and critical discourse analysis (CDA) as research tools to assess the columnists’ objectivity and bias in his depiction of the then president and several prominent politicians during the examined period. Data analysis constitutes six newspaper articles which were purposively selected to obtain a representative sample. The results indicated that these articles were well-researched in respect of the information they presented. At the same time, biased tendencies were noted in favor of the political party aligned to the columnist.