The Box: The Democratic Alliance of South Africa Looking To Sell The Nation’s Public Broadcaster

Muvhango - SAbc

Africa: Solly Malatsi, of the Democratic Alliance, has been appointed by Cyril Ramaphosa as South Africa’s 15th minister of communication and digital technologies. The ANC’s appointment of Solly Malatsi could result in significant policy changes for South Africa’s communications sector, especially for its public broadcaster. The Department of Communications, now led by Malatsi, will focus on updating its technology in the public broadcasting sector. One of its updates will be switching from analog to digital terrestrial television (DTT). South Africa’s public broadcaster, SABC, has struggled for years to keep up with the constant technological changes. The recently published policy document for South Africa’s information and communication technology (ICT) sector suggested the DA may sell off and break up SABC. According to the DA's policy document, "There is no doubt that the SABC is in crisis" with 40% of its revenue just going to pay salaries, with the party saying "it is clear that the SABC is a bloated organization in dire need of fixing.”

The DA wants to hold public hearings to determine whether South Africa needs a public broadcaster. Depending on the results, the SABC may be “broken up into various commercial entities and sold to the highest bidder.” The second part of the plan is to decentralize the SABC into provincial broadcasting stations to be “independently run by and managed by the relevant provinces.” According to the DA’s policy document, the decentralization aims to “encompass a resource-sharing model” that is similar to the broadcasting model of the United States. This model will reduce costs because of the increased cooperation between provincial broadcasters.

In the case that the SABC remains a public broadcaster in South Africa, the DA says that it would be important to ensure that the public interest comes first. The DA wants to emphasize the importance that the SABC remains an independent public broadcaster “as per the Broadcasting Act, and not a platform for political interference and corruption.”

The SABC continues to lose money as the broadcaster takes its most-watched shows off the air. As of early July, the SABC canceled Muvhango on SABC2. After 27 years of run time, Muvhang was still the channel’s most-watched show. The Venda soap ran out of produced episodes and left SABC2 with a gap in the 8:00 p.m. timeslot. Muvhango, created by Duma Ndlovu and produced by Word of Mouth Pictures, has completely shut down with no new contract extension or further episodes in place. June 15 was the final day of work for the cast and crew. The SABC and SABC2 gave viewers no warning that the July 2 Muvhango episode would be the last. The series was SABC’s first Tshivenda language drama, which started in April 1997.

Just before its cancellation,  Danie Odendaal Productions also stopped production, withheld episode delivery, and forced the SABC to pay outstanding debts in the millions of rand before further episodes were given to SABC2. The SABC is in a similar situation with Muvhango. The public broadcaster has put close to 200 people out of work. Muvhango has 175 people working on the show, almost doubling the amount of crew that has been cut due to the SABC’s financial losses. The SABC failed to respond as to why Muvhango was canceled so abruptly.

The public broadcaster is technically “insolvent” and can no longer afford to produce large ensemble cast shows. Muvhango reigned in 1.29 million viewers in May 2024 with a 13.4% share. Muvhango’s shutdown comes after continuous failed payments of the cast and crew. Over the past few years, the staff decided several times to not show up for work to demand payments.

According to an insider connected to Muvhango "Duma Ndlovu has so many productions with M-Net's Mzansi Magic that he couldn't give a rat's ass about Muvhango. With the new government, he no longer has the right political connections so they're not renewing because the SABC has no money anyway.”

Ji Chang Wook - The Chosunilbo JNS

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