/ 29 March 1996

‘Hookey’ councillor Viljoen leaves IBA

Justin Pearce

Stellenbosch University vice-rector Christo Viljoen leaves the Independent Broadcasting Authority this week, amid rumblings from within the IBA that he rarely turned up for duty in Johannesburg although he received a full-time salary for seven months.

Viljoen, a former chairman of the South African Broadcasting Corporation —he also did that job part-time — was appointed as a councillor when the IBA was established in March 1994. He was appointed to serve the IBA in a part-time capacity on the basis of his expertise in the technical side of broadcasting and his experience with the SABC of old.

Councillors who were appointed to the IBA were given the option of full- or part-time service. Viljoen opted for part-time service owing to the demands of his top executive position at Stellenbosch.

Initially he received a full councillor’s salary. Viljoen said he was on full salary only for the first two months of his period of office. But IBA representative Amos Vilakazi said Viljoen had continued to receive full payment until September 1994.

Viljoen said that he had received a full salary in the beginning because things were “deurmekaar” at the IBA then. He said during his first few months of office he had devoted at least as much time to IBA duties as the full-time councillors.

Salary payments to Viljoen were stopped after dissatisfaction from within the IBA that he was receiving remuneration in the same league as full-time councillors who were devoting long hours to IBA duties.

Vilakazi said Viljoen’s salary was stopped at such a point that his total earnings over his two-year period of service would be equivalent to a 40% salary of a full-time councillor.

Yet while Vilakazi said the IBA was satisfied with the way Viljoen had discharged his duties, dissatisfaction remains that Viljoen was not pulling his weight on the council.

“This year he only attended half the meetings he was supposed to”, said an IBA insider.

Viljoen insists he had fulfilled his duties on the IBA, often working from his office in Stellenbosch, just as he had served the SABC first as a board member and latterly as chairman.

He said, however, that he had decided not to make himself available for a second term of service on the IBA council because: “I found it was not possible to attend to my part-time duties.”

Viljoen said he had never received any of the fringe benefits such as car and housing allowances which are enjoyed by other councillors. “This is not a gravy train,” he insisted. But Vilakazi said Viljoen, while he was receiving a salary, had received a package of R320 000 per annum, including benefits.