The SABC may be getting a new boss but the wrangle over Afrikaans on TV1 continues — while radio has quietly solved the problem, reports Mark Gevisser
SABC board chairman Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri is set to announce today the appointment of Zwelakhe Sisulu as the corporation’s group chief executive. The board is also considering a radical language model for the SABC’s 22 radio stations.
At a meeting on Wednesday night, the board agreed to appoint Sisulu to take over from Wynand Harmse, who will retire in September. Sisulu, former editor of The New Nation, is currently head of the corporation’s Transformation Unit and acting editor-in-chief of Television News Productions.
Matsepe-Casaburri was unavailable for comment, but senior SABC sources noted there were two outstanding issues surrounding Sisulu’s appointment: whether he should have a deputy because of his lack of experience in broadcasting, and whether Harmse should remain on as a consultant.
The board has also, finally, filled the post of director of human resources, which has been vacant for months. The new appointment is Maki Ndlhovu, who was the Independent Electoral Commission’s director of human resources in electoral adminstration.
Meanwhile, as the furore over the status of Afrikaans on TV1 grows, radio executives have quietly been formulating a language model for SABC radio. The model, believed to have been drafted by head of regional radio Solly Mokoetle, was discussed with SABC unions yesterday and is under consideration by the board’s language sub-committee.
The new model provides for 11 national unilingual public broadcasting services, one for each of the official languages. Mokoetle commented: “It seeks to redress the historical imbalances whereby only English and Afrikaans are seen as national languages and were given the resources to broadcast nationally. Now all 11 languages will be uplifted to the level that they provide services to their people in a comprehensive manner.”
There is bound to be controversy over Radio South Africa: SABC radio head Govin Reddy, for example, envisages RSA as the SABC’s flagship radio service. But if this model is adopted, Radio South Africa and Afrikaans Stereo will be assigned exactly the same status as all nine African- language services.
Central to the scheme is a network system giving each language a national service operated from the region where it is most spoken, and regional transmission-splits in other areas where at least 5 000 people speak it as their first language. For example, Radio Zulu’s national service will be run from Durban, but there will also be regional broadcasts from Northern Natal and the PWV.
Multilingual regional production centres will feed each national service with local news and programming. If you are Zulu-speaking and live in the PWV, you will be able to pick up national Zulu programming originating from Durban and regional programming, broadcast during split- transmitter time, from Johannesburg.
While you listen to Johannesburg programming, Zulu-speakers in Northern Natal will be able to listen to local programming broadcast from Newcastle. The Newcastle regional production centre will also provide regional programming for the Sesotho and Swazi services.
Before the model can be put into practice it must first be costed. Regional operations must be strengthened, and a transmitter network grid worked out. In addition, an extensive demographic study has to be done to assign locations for the regional production centres, the transmission splits and contributing bureaux.
The model does not deal with the fate of the SABC’s commercial stations such as 5FM and Radio Metro, but notes that two additional public service stations will have to be started. These, and all other final decisions, rest with the Independent Broadcasting Authority. Mokoetle noted that “this model forms the basis of what we will present as a submission to the IBA.
“The SABC cannot survive with 22 radio stations in this new environment where we are under pressure to allow new players to come in. Right now the SABC is hybrid, and doesn’t really know whether it is a commerical or a public broadcaster. But our mandate requires us to be a public service broadcaster. And so this model is the minimum of what we must deliver.”