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AZAPO ON SABC
by
Mosibudi Mangena
25 June
2009
The SABC is imploding. The drama unfolding before our eyes at
the public broadcaster would have been entertaining if it were
not such a serious matter for our country.
At the time of writing, the majority of board members at the
SABC had resigned, including the chairperson, leaving the board
without a quorum and unable to convene meetings or to conduct
any business related to their mandate to lead the SABC.
The same board has been at war with the CEO of the SABC for
months, involving endless court cases and litigation.
The SABC management team is in disarray, embroiled in internal
battles, mistrust and poor coordination. One hand does not know
what the other is doing. The free for all in different sections
has led to poor management of resources at the corporation.
The organisation is in serious financial difficulties, unable to
pay producers of the programmes it flights on air, other service
providers, and to honour salary increases to its workers which
were agreed years ago. The public broadcaster has now approached
its sole shareholder, the state, to request a bail out of
several billion rands.
An acrimonious public debate is now taking place in Parliament,
where the portfolio committee is quizzing both the SABC Board
and the management on the goings on at the corporation.
What is not being said is that the SABC and its board are, in
part, casualties of the political convulsions and dynamics that
have been going on for years in the ruling party.
The ill – fated board was recommended by a deeply divided
portfolio committee and appointed by the President of the
country who was fighting divisions in his own party. Some in the
portfolio committee joined others outside Parliament in calling
for either the dissolution or resignation of the SABC board.
It is clear that the SABC management took advantage of the
legitimacy crisis of the board to undermine it, and in certain
instances, to engage in their own battles along the lines of the
divisions in the ruling party.
The SABC is a powerful instrument and whoever controls it gains
an important political advantage. That’s why it is a general
political battle ground for political parties in general, but
particularly so among the factions in the ruling party.
Just as the police, the judiciary, the NPA and the intelligence
agencies were affected by the strife in the ruling party, so is
the SABC seriously contaminated by these dynamics.
The SABC is the public broadcaster, which means that it must
educate, entertain and serve the public in our country. It is
not a state broadcaster that panders to the wishes of the
government of the day or the ruling party.
All of us in this country - as political parties, civil society
and any other manifestation of society, must stand up to demand
that the SABC be properly run, be independent of political
control or bias.
We will be shirking our responsibilities if we did nothing. Let
us insist on an SABC board that is competent, independent and
credible.
Let’s play a role as the process start to put a new board in
place, and we should insist that the management of the SABC be
subordinate to that board. |