Mathatha Tsedu, who resigned as the SA Broadcasting
Corporation’s acting head of news on Monday, has been appointed editor of the Sunday Times.
Tsedu told Sapa he signed his contract with the newspaper on Monday afternoon.
”I am happy and looking forward to it,” he said.
Sunday Times managing editor Peter Malherbe is currently the acting editor of the weekly newspaper.
The previous incumbent, Mike Robertson, was appointed the publisher a few months ago.
Tsedu, who is also the chairman of the SA National Editors’ Forum, said he held a meeting with SABC staff earlier in the day and explained that he was leaving ”for personal reasons and family
issues”.
He described his SABC position as a ”pressure cooker of a job” saying he was not able to concentrate enough of his time on family matters.
Tsedu was appointed acting chief executive of SABC news last month following the resignation of his boss, Barney Mthombothi. He joined the public broadcaster last year as deputy head of news.
Before that, he was the deputy editor of The Star newspaper.
SABC group chief executive Peter Matlare said Tsedu’s
resignation was not related to recent developments and appointments at SABC news.
”The SABC regrets Mathatha’s resignation. He is a valued member and leader of the news team and he was a core part of the team which effected recent appointments at SABC news.
”He, and the SABC, continue to believe that the appointment in June of Jimi Matthews and in July of Pippa Green, were prudent and will add value to the SABC’s coverage of news and current affairs,”
he said.
Matthews was appointed head of television news while Green became head of radio news. Matlare said the appointments were part of a broader strategy to ensure higher editorial standards by the public broadcaster.
He said the broadcaster was in the process of identifying people to join the team which made editorial decisions for the news department. The full team should be in place by mid-September, Matlare said.
SABC representative Ihron Rensburg said it had not yet been decided who would replace Tsedu, who starts at the weekly in September.
Meanwhile SABC’s board will appear before the National
Assembly’s communications committee on Tuesday where its apparent inability to retain its newsroom leadership is expected to come under the spotlight.
African National Congress MP and committee chairman Nat Kekana told Sapa: ”My concern is that there appears to be no leadership retention strategy in the SABC newsroom. It’s a big worry. We are concerned about the instability.”
Other problems that would be raised with the SABC’s board, included the question of language policy on television, Kekana said.
”We are still picking up many, many complaints that television broadcasting is predominantly English. The SABC is not satisfying the language requirements of the Constitution.”
According to the latest Amps figures, e-tv was the number one English-speaking television station, and had overtaken SABC 3 and M-Net, Kekana said.
”We are concerned that TV3 appears not to be the cash-cow it was once expected to be, and has been overtaken by e-tv.”
This had implications for advertising and the
cross-subsidisation of the public service by the SABC’s commercial service, he said.
Kekana said the board would also be asked to explain to what extent profitable African-language radio stations, such as Lesedi, were cross-subsidising other language-stations, such as SAFM. – Sapa