Ann Eveleth
KING Goodwill Zwelithini pulled out of a consortium bidding for KwaZulu-Natal’s new private sound radio station last week because he didn’t know what he was getting into, say royal family members.
Zwelithini mysteriously dropped his 5% stake and yanked his endorsement for Radio One – one of two consortiums bidding for the station at an Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) application hearing in Durban last week – shortly after the hearings.
The monarch’s legal advisor S’dumo Mathe said the decision followed “new facts revealed during the (IBA) hearing”.
Royal family members say the monarch was ill-informed about the implications of his endorsement prior to the hearing and “had no idea his letter of endorsement written in February 1995 would be used to support an application or that this bid was being opposed”.
It has been established that the monarch had given his blessing to Radio One’s proposed Zulu-language radio station when he was approached by one-time Inkatha Freedom Party business consultant Laurence Anthony. Radio One will have 90% of its programmes in Zulu with a format which is a combination of talk and music.
Anthony contacted Zwelithini via another family member last year. “What the king didn’t know is that his support would be used to bolster Radio One’s black empowerment credentials in competition with another black empowerment consortium,” said one source.
The monarch was also apparently unaware his trust would have to purchase the 5% stake “which only came into the picture in the run-up to the hearing”.
Profits accruing to the trust through which the shares would be held were intended for development projects. Radio One’s Anthony – a 20% shareholder in the consortium together with electronics firm Push (35%), Boland Financial Services (25%), electronic media consultants Cognas (5%) and City Press (15%) – said the consortium “understands the reasons for [Zwelithini’s] decision to withdraw and we support his decision”, but declined to comment on the reasons behind the move.
Anthony said the king’s proposed stake was to have formed part of a 40% black empowerment shareholding which would include City Press – provided negotiations now under way for a black consortium including former IFP secretary-general Oscar Dhlomo’s Dynamo Investments to purchase the newspaper were successful.
Anthony argued the radio bid’s competition “ceased to be an issue” after the IBA refused to hear the application of competing consortium KZNfm last week. “They can’t be heard again on the same application,” he said.
IBA representative Amos Vilikazi disagreed: “When an application is not heard on a technical reason, that does not nullify the application.
The IBA agreed to hear KZNfm’s bid early next year after public notification procedures are met,” he said.
KZNfm will have a ratio of 70% Zulu to 30% English language programmes. It will play mostly local music catering for 15 to 35- year-olds.
Vilikazi said the IBA decision not to hear the KZNfm bid was not related to earlier reports that the two consortiums were contemplating a merger on the eve of the hearings: “They officially informed a merger was being contemplated, but they arrived at the hearings as two separate entities.”
Anthony said the two had “held loose talks” on a possible merger, but had decided against the move.
Anthony says his share in Radio One (via a trust) was “totally unrelated” to his family’s ownership of the Empangeni-based Zululand Observer newspaper.
In Durban the IBA will issue one new FM licence and no MW licence.