FRIDAY, 1.00PM
PARLIAMENT’S communications committee convened a hasty meeting today (Friday) to be told that councillors were required to give three months notice. Only the president may dismiss a councillor for misconduct.
But the committee resolved to accept the resignations and call for new applications for posts as speedily as possible. The IBA is unable to function until then, because it lacks the neccessary quorum, disrupting the plans of a great many media companies bidding for licences.
FRIDAY, 8.00AM
THE Independent Broadcasting Authority’s councillors voted unanimously to suspend CEO Harris Gxaweni last night — and then five of the seven councillors resigned. Only two councillors, John Matisson and Pieter Lotriet, neither of whom figured in the “gravy train” scandal, remain.
The five councillors, including co-chairmen Peter de Klerk and Sebiletso Mokone-Matabane, accepted collective responsibility for the breakdown of financial and administrative controls. There is speculation that the unexpected mass departure follows intense pressure from broadcasting minister Jay Naidoo, who was quick to welcome the resignations. But Naidoo may also be aiming to move a reshaped IBA under his own wing, merging it with his telecommunications authority, Satra.
The most controversial councillor, Lydnal Shope-Molefe, said she had resigned because “for some time we have had a problem of trust in the council.” Two of the councillors who resigned were only recently appointed and did not figure in the auditor general’s damning report.
Suspended CEO Gxaweni remains on the payroll until a decision is reached about his future. Gxaweni said he found it “strange” that the councillors had failed to give adequate reasons for suspending him: “I can only hope that a proper investigation will investigate all the allegations against me and the matter is laid to rest.”