Representatives of civil society on Monday during a public debate said the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) is a state apparatus whose job it is to serve the government as a ”mouthpiece”.
This is in contrast to how the SABC describes itself — as a public broadcaster.
SABC strategic corporate services chief executive Ihron Rensburg noted that state broadcasters operate outside of a legitimate and independent regulatory environment.
While state broadcasters only report and depict the views of the government and its organs, this is not the case at the SABC, as it also gives the opposition and civil society coverage, he argued.
Rensburg believes that discussion should now move away from whether the corporation is a state or a public broadcaster to whether it is delivering quality programming as well as content — and, if so, to what extent.
Mail & Guardian editor Ferial Haffajee said there is no need to debate whether the SABC is a state or a public broadcaster, instead deriding it as ”a soap opera”, citing the exodus of SABC bosses — Joe Thloloe, Peter Matlare and recently Judi Nwokedi — as an example of a never-ending story.
She cried foul at the so-called political appointments — a reference to individuals such as Miranda Strydom and Snuki Zikalala landing top jobs in the newsroom.
Members of the public accused the SABC of persistently punting the government, the president and the ruling party, no matter how petty or irrelevant the subject is.
Such action serves as a red herring and diverts attention from issues that are of public interest, they said.
Questions raised about the coverage — or lack thereof — of HIV/Aids issues were met with Rensburg’s assertion that the SABC has done well on that front. He alluded to accolades the broadcaster has collected for HIV/Aids-related reportage.
Jane Duncan of the Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI), the organiser of the event, said on the back of some of the dynamics playing out at the corporation, ”maybe we should consider a debate that looks as to whether the SABC is a ruling-party broadcaster or a public broadcaster”.
She said it is ”completely inappropriate” that the decision to appoint the top three bosses — CEO, chief operations officer and chief financial officer — lies directly with the minister of communications. This position compromises the sovereignty of the SABC board and potentially has a detrimental impact on content.
Rensburg conceded that the process of appointing the SABC board needs an overhaul.
While decrying the lack of community participation at processes such as the regulator’s public hearings pertaining to licensing conditions, the FXI hailed what it described as ”growing activism”. — I-Net Bridge