Joe Thloloe is a media freedom champion known in journalism circles as ‘Bra Joe’. He was interviewed on the eve of Black Wednesday/Media Freedom Day, which commemorates the events of 19 October 1977, when 18 organisations were banned, editors arrested and three publications (The World, Weekend World and the church publication Pro Veritate) were shut down by the apartheid government. On that day, Thloloe was already in jail.