As SABC’s radio division prepares for a major relaunch, staffers complain of burgeoning bureaucracy.
Philippa Garson reports
THE departure of three senior SABC radio executives could not have happened at a worse time for the government broadcaster’s radio division.
Set to relaunch itself amid ongoing internal problems and looming competition from independent radio stations, the last thing the division needs is a spate of resignations, say a number of discontented members of the corporation.
SAfm head Jack Mullen, an internationally recognised radio playwright; Coen Gous, dynamic head of the advertising division, Radio Active; and Radio Xhosa manager Tembela Mhlengi have quit the service within days of each other.
The resignations will compound problems for the station gearing up to relaunch itself with fanfare in October. Staffers complain of a lack of leadership and burgeoning bureaucracy of both the “old” guard and the “new”, which hinders the transformation of the division.
“The division is imploding on itself. It has not transformed properly. Nor is it capable of meeting the competition which is about to hit it,” commented one insider who asked not to be named.
Six of the SABC’s regional stations are being sold and by the end of the year 12 new private radio stations could be up and running in direct competition to the public broadcaster.
Despite a government grant of R40-million to the corporation to get educational programming for radio and television, neither departmental heads nor staff were in place to meet the July deadline. But, radio chief Govin Reddy said the three education positions will be filled shortly.
Reddy said management was “very excited” about the “repositioning of several stations” in October, which would signal new names and programme content for the language stations.
Unlike staffers who responded with shock to the news of the three resignations, Reddy was sanguine, saying the resignations were “not really significant. We have 23 stations and only two station managers have resigned in the two-and-a-half years I’ve been there.”
Reddy said the resignations had to be seen in their individual contexts: Mullen resigned for “a change”, but was still committed to the SABC, and Mhlengi resigned because of a dispute with staff and unions at the station.
Mullen told the Mail & Guardian he was leaving because he “had had enough of being in management”. He said he was not a “natural manager” and wanted to return to creative writing.
Colleague Talk at Will presenter Will Bernard said it was time “management saw the difference between managing the editorial and managing the administrative side. Creative people should not be spending their days in meetings discussing the colour of carpets.”