Rescheduling has led to a struggle to save programmes, reports Jacquie Golding-Duffy
AN embattled SABC current affairs division is scrambling to salvage some of its programmes in the wake of a shake-up in the department’s schedules.
Viewers of SABC3 will only have one current affairs slot a week, scheduled for 9.30pm on Thursdays, while viewers of the other two channels are fortunate, for now, not to suffer any cutbacks.
It emerged this week that SABC3 channel head, Louis Raubenheimer, plans to alternate the channel’s only two current affairs programmes: Q&A for 13 weeks, followed by Focus Features for the next season.
Both programmes implemented by current affairs head, Sarah Crowe, kicked off about three months ago, but low Audience Ratings (ARs), a lack of advertising, the premature departure of Q&A presenter Max du Preez and increasing costs have forced the SABC to take action in line with cost-cutting recommendations by the US consultancy, Mckinsey.
Insiders say the thousands of rands spent on the revamped Q&A set do not justify the poor ARs which average at four. A good rating is eight ARs.
Crowe disagrees. “The ratings of Q&A have been exceptionally good,” she says, adding that the revamp costs were minimal, no more than R60 000.
Q&A executive producer Iza Trengove cautions that the ratings have to be seen in context. SABC3’s limited footprint has to be considered, she says, while Du Preez says the programme’s scheduled time of 9.30pm is “post prime-time”, which means most viewers have moved on to doing other things during the evening rather than staying glued to the box.
Trengove argues that the SABC is moving towards a “seasonal approach”, with Q&A shifting to the Thursday 9.30pm slot and Focus Features taking a back seat until July.
But insiders allege that the seasonal approach is a “milder way of implementing cost cutting” – with the axe having swung at SABC3 first.
Du Preez, who initially was planning to leave the Q&A show after its 13-week season ended, was abruptly informed 24 hours before his programme that he must announce the change in time slot as well as his departure. Staffers close to Du Preez have said the unprofessional handling of the schedule change will impact negatively on viewers as the SABC failed, as it has before, to warn viewers well in advance of programme reshuffling. “This exacerbates an already serious problem for viewers … not being able to find anything on television.”
Du Preez will be concentrating on his baby – The Truth Commission Special Report – which has been pulling in consistently high ratings of eight ARs and more.
It is claimed by staffers that current affairs programmes, mostly the Focus programmes, are not only failing to deliver audiences but that, overall, programmes “miss the mark”. However, critics of Focus programmes say the independently produced current affairs programmes like the TRC Special Report and Two Way have proved that it is possible to be informative and controversial as well as entertaining – and still attract audiences.
The viewer, it seems, could enjoy a better quality of programme should the SABC make better use of journalists and producers as well as differentiate between staid programming and pretentious studio-based debates which are too short and have no impact.
Television News editor-in-chief Joe Thloloe, however, argues that current affairs is on track, although he concedes that the division is “not succeeding with our language mandate”.
The dissatisfaction about the lack of indigenous slots for actuality stems from a dilemma facing the SABC as a corporation, says Thloloe. “Lack of finances and advertising has pushed current affairs out of prime-time viewing.
“As soon as the SABC makes enough money to carry current affairs programmes, it could be restored to its former prime slots,” says Thloloe.
The current affairs programme envisaged by SABC chief executive Zwelakhe Sisulu and other seasoned journalists has not been realised, partly due to incompetence and lack of proactiveness on the part of senior management, say some staffers. Others argue that the SABC is a maze with the most uncreative people occupying the upper echelons and those who have concrete contributions at the coalface are either being sidelined or ignored.
`More research into audience preferences have to be conducted and the SABC has to attempt to keep in touch with its viewers,” says one Focus producer who refused to be named.
Although Crowe agrees that research is a vital tool in assessing the needs of viewers, she denies that poor ARs are responsible for the schedule shifts. “Rescheduling is a decision made by channel heads and has nothing to do with ARs.
“We are fighting a battle with the channel heads to find a dedicated slot for Focus Features, but this remains undecided for now.”
However, she adds that current affairs programming is “often shooting in the dark” and programmes cannot be tailored to please everyone’s needs.
Q&A’s Tuesday slot is being filled by sports after, it is believed, a deal clinched between chief executive of television Jill Chisholm and sports head, Edward Griffiths.
Fingers have been pointed at Chisholm who some staffers accuse of being responsible for edging current affairs programmes out of prime-time viewing.
But Chisholm’s response to these accusations is a curt “absolutely not true”, adding that she thought current affairs has been producing some “excellent programmes”.
Crowe, who replaced Ameen Akhalwaya in September last year, promised, at the time, that the new-look current affairs slots would contain more human interest as well as be more controversial and racy. The new look, which has been sported for three months now, has not only failed to attract audiences but has caused dissension in the ranks of internal SABC staffers operating in the division.
Black staffers have complained that the revamped division caters for a mostly white audience and is not fulfilling a public service mandate. Nguni-speaking viewers have been sidelined on SABC1 with the scrapping of the Nguni current affairs slot in favour of English. Priority, argue staffers, is being given to English and Afrikaans and current affairs is, therefore, failing to reflect the demographics of the country.
Crowe says the SABC “is in flux” with its language policy and the department did not always have the capacity to develop staffers because of financial constraints. “The lack of money has staff implications,” she says.
“The fatal move by current affairs was when it broke up the package of news and current affairs, shifting the current affairs programmes to at least an hour after the news.
“This move coupled with a weak package for viewers at 9.30pm is dealing a death blow to the state of current affairs and debate,” says one producer.
“Trying to make sense of the failed current affairs facelift is like trying to make sense of the SABC which is an impossible task with its managers, who fail to confer, consult or even effectively communicate with staffers,” says another producer.