The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) has postponed a court interdict that would have prevented a screening of the controversial documentary Unauthorised: Thabo Mbeki by the Mail & Guardian in Johannesburg on Wednesday evening.
The screening, to more than 200 invited guests at the M&G‘s Critical Thinking Forum, will go ahead as planned, and two representatives of the SABC will take part in a panel discussion following the screening.
Future screenings will be planned in partnership between the SABC, the producers, the M&G and the Harold Wolpe Memorial Trust, which helped organise the current screenings.
Earlier in the day, the M&G and the trustees of the Harold Wolpe trust were named in an interdict application that would have been heard in court on Wednesday afternoon.
If successful, the interdict would have prevented the screening of the film and force the M&G to deliver to the SABC all copies of the documentary in its possession.
The Critical Thinking Forum is a series of debate sessions on controversial topics, hosted by the M&G.
”We welcome the outcome and believe that freedom of expression and our national spirit of debate is better served in this way rather than through court action,” M&G editor Ferial Haffajee and the documentary’s co-producers, Ben Cashdan and Redi Direko, said.
Lawyers’ letter
In an urgent letter to the M&G on Wednesday morning by SB Sithole Incorporated Attorneys, the broadcaster had demanded an undertaking by the newspaper not to screen the documentary until the finalisation of a dispute between the SABC and Broad Daylight Films, which produced the documentary.
This referred especially to planned screenings of the film at the M&G‘s Critical Thinking Forum in Johannesburg and Cape Town, as well as in other parts of the country.
”In the event that you do not furnish us with the above undertakings, the SABC will have no option but to approach the high court for urgent relief,” the letter stated.
On Tuesday, the SABC had threatened a court interdict against Broad Daylight and Cashdan. The M&G had not been named in the court papers served then. That application has now been removed from the court roll at the request of the SABC, head of group communications Kaizer Kganyago said.
In Wednesday’s lawyers’ letter, the broadcaster said it holds the copyright to the documentary, for which it paid Broad Daylight Films and Cashdan. It referred to a written agreement between itself and Cashdan regarding the production of the documentary.
”Broad Daylight has recently purported to cancel the agreement,” the SABC’s letter said. ”The SABC, however, does not accept that the agreement has been validly or lawfully cancelled and accordingly continues to hold Broad Daylight to the terms of the agreement.”
The documentary has already been shown in Grahamstown, Durban, Pietermaritzburg and East London, Cashdan told the M&G Online on Tuesday.
Undertaking
The SABC also said on Wednesday that it had received an undertaking by Cashdan and Broad Daylight not to screen the documentary. However, co-producer Direko said the undertaking they provided was aimed at future screenings after July 26, and not the current series of screenings.
”We pointed out clearly to the SABC in our undertaking that we are in no position to halt the screenings already arranged. In fact, we worked in good faith with the Mail & Guardian and Harold Wolpe trust to set up these screenings, and we see no reason why they should be cancelled. Hundreds of people are looking forward to seeing the film,” she said.
On the copyright issue, Direko said: ”We do not accept SABC’s assertion that the film is their property. We cancelled our contract with the SABC in writing on March 2 2007. They have never challenged this cancellation.
”We informed them on April 17 2007 that we would proceed with the screenings, and we even invited them to be part of the events. They at no stage asked us to stop. Therefore we find their attempt to drag us and our colleagues into court on an urgent pretext quite inappropriate.”
The SABC’s Kganyago had in June been invited by the M&G to take part in the forum discussion, but declined the invitation at the time.
The broadcaster has delayed the screening of the documentary, which is reportedly critical of Mbeki, for more than a year.
The initial canning of the documentary caused an outcry, with accusations of self-censorship levelled against the national broadcaster. At the time, the SABC said the programme was canned because ”internal approval processes were not correctly followed”.
The storm over the documentary was preceded by a furore over the SABC’s banning of certain political commentators.
Screenings of the documentary are planned for Orlando Community Hall in Soweto on July 19, MuseuMAfricA in Johannesburg on July 20, Oliver Tambo Hall in Khayelitsha on July 23, the Iziko Museum in Cape Town on July 24, the KwaSuka Theatre in Durban on July 25 and the KwaMashu Indoor Sports Centre, KwaMashu, on July 26.