Rabia Mayet | rabiamayet@radioislam.co.za

22 June 2026

3-minute read

A groundbreaking report has revealed that journalists in South Africa are using AI tools while newsrooms lack formal policies around them.

AI is already deeply embedded in newsrooms across the country, offering significant efficiencies but raising concerns about training, trust and ethics.

Karen Allen, who authored the report alongside Herman Wasserman and Nande Mbekela on how journalists in print, broadcast and digital media use AI in their work, refers to it as a “staggering thing.”  Journalists in newsrooms often learn to use the tool from a colleague who is predisposed to using it regularly, but without formal, systematic training and policies, they are clueless as to how exactly how it should be used.

The main uses among journalists are translation, research, transcription purposes, to write headlines, reversion copy and for creating social media shorts. With the mounting pressure to create and provide material quickly for various different formats, AI is “particularly useful,” says Karen. However, the problem is that AI consistently throws out unverified information not based on fact or not properly sourced. In this country, a specific challenge for AI is “dealing with the many vernacular languages” as it is quite useless in translating a piece into one of them.

A major risk of using AI is the “hallucinated content” that it throws out, causing the credibility of established journalists to be doubted. Another is the aspect of plagiarism that leads to bland content that lacks the credibility and authenticity of traditional journalists. Over-reliance on AI is an additional setback as many journalists have come to use it even when it does not add value to the content they are producing.

The uses of AI are not always apparent, Karen mentions, but there are many benefits to the tool if used correctly, and if journalists are aware that the information thrown out by AI may not be verifiable. AI has the potential to strengthen journalism when it is used to work through data for investigations, and for reversion copy, as long as there is a functional human behind it to verify the information.

Management is looking to set up AI policies, but South African newsrooms still have a long way to go. We can’t be “building a plane whilst flying it,” Karen emphasizes. The study’s key recommendation was the “urgent need for training” at the operational level and in line with newsroom policies, teaching journalists how to “use AI safely and effectively,” and teaching them when not to use it. Essentially, journalists need to be reminded that “they are there to hold power to account, they are there to bear witness and they are there to produce objective reporting.

Listen to the full interview with Ml Ibrahim Daya and Karen Allen here.