ABSTRACT
This paper addresses the old debate that has occupied much of the Marxist and later political economy approaches to studying communication-who owns the media and to what end? The answer, it is argued, runs beyond conventional explanations of the media being hegemonic tools of control and consensus-generation to more a reflection of the complex ways in which crony capitalism and systemic corruption have crept into every public institution, news media being no exception. Indeed, it is the media which may be more susceptible to it than other sectors of the economy, as this article demonstrates.
