South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) boss Dali Mpofu suspended his news chief Snuki Zikalala this week because the SABC board was intent on replacing him with Zikalala as acting CEO of the broadcaster. The board wanted to suspend Mpofu for insubordination and mismanagement.
To ward off the palace coup, Mpofu suspended Zikalala first, provoking a political crisis and a fresh blow to the broadcaster’s credibility.
‘I don’t know about that,†said Zikalala when approached for comment this week. ‘I am relaxing and reading [Mark Gevisser’s biography of Thabo Mbeki] A Dream Deferred.â€
Three senior sources familiar with the circumstances confirmed that the board’s game plan had been to appoint Zikalala acting CEO, though chairperson Kanyi Mkhonza said: ‘There’s no truth to that.â€
The executive-suite drama has provoked the ANC in Parliament to further action. It now wants the entire SABC board to walk the plank — although some current members might return to what MPs believe would be a more legitimately constituted body.
But President Thabo Mbeki is hanging tough — and only the president can dismiss the board. In the absence of real powers the ANC’s communications study group plans to use Parliament to put pressure on Mbeki and cut off the flow of public money to the SABC.
Last week the portfolio committee on communications passed a motion of no confidence in the SABC board.
On Wednesday this week the ANC study group planned to read a statement in Parliament calling upon Mbeki to dissolve the board. The reading was abandoned after a confrontation with presidency strong-man Essop Pahad, who angrily faced down MPs in a marathon study-group meeting that lasted until just before midnight, according to a person who was present.
Nevertheless, the name of Southern Cape MP Randy Pieterse appeared first on the list of MPs due to make statements on Wednesday afternoon. He was prevented from doing so when party whips, apparently prompted by Pahad and a nervous Communications Minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri, ordered them out of the chamber to consult with the party’s communications chief, Arts and Culture Minister Pallo Jordan.
Jordan and the mild-mannered chairperson of the portfolio committee, Ishmael Vadi, attempted to broker a deal that would prevent the potentially embarrassing spectacle of ANC backbenchers taking on the Cabinet in the full glare of the National Assembly. The team intent on making the call to dissolve the board included MPs Lumka Yengeni, Khotso Khumalo and Pieterse.
By the time they returned to the chamber, the half-hour allotted for members’ statements had expired.
The statement, which the Mail & Guardian has obtained, was to say that this week’s developments at the SABC ‘reaffirmed [the committee’s] vote of no confidenceâ€.
‘Given the seriousness of the problem it leaves us with no other option but to call for the dissolution of the entire board and start the entire process again.â€
One compromise position in the ANC caucus was that a member’s statement alone would serve adequate notice on Mbeki. Others wanted Parliament to debate and vote on a formal motion, the strongest statement Parliament could make under the circumstances.
It now appears both may happen. Caucus spokesperson Khotso Khumalo told the M&G space will be found in next Tuesday’s parliamentary programme for the statement, while a formal motion will be tabled with speaker Baleka Mbete for debate in the house on June 2.
A further consequence of the battle will be that Matsepe-Casaburri will be forced to delay until June 27 her presentation of the communications department’s budget vote, which was due next Tuesday. ANC MPs have said they will not accept her budget if it contains SABC funding proposals signed off by a compromised board.
That will prevent new funds flowing from the national treasury to the broadcaster.
‘We want to put a tree stump in the way so this matter [of the SABC] is resolved,†said a committee member, adding that this was the parliamentary ANC’s only leverage with Cabinet. ‘We want to increase public pressure on the board to stand down.â€
Presidential spokesperson Mukoni Ratshitanga said Mbeki would not comment on the crisis at the SABC and believed that due processes had been followed in appointing its board. Pahad’s office said in a statement: ‘From my side there was no question of a row and I have no problems with any members of the portfolio committee.â€
The week of long knives saw Mpofu waiting outside a late-night board meeting on Tuesday. He was given a letter of suspension between 1am and 2am on Wednesday, said an associate, just hours after Mpofu had suspended Zikalala.
For some time Zikalala has been probing Mpofu’s focus on non-broadcasting issues like his Total Citizen Empowerment programme, said a management insider.
The former news chief had asked tough questions about declining revenues and audiences, leading to a schism between the two men, with Zikalala beginning to believe he could lead the SABC more adeptly.
Reign of crises
Mpofu’s has been a reign of crises and he has ramped up spending while advertising revenues are in general decline. In addition, several vital positions, including those of chief operations officer and chief technical officer, have not been filled, while lucrative broadcasting rights have been lost to satellite sports channel Supersport.
All this led to the filing of a memorandum by board chairperson Kanyi Mkhonza early in April criticising Mpofu. It set out board grievances against the CEO and requested that lawyers investigate. Since then, political forces have joined the battle, with the post-Polokwane ANC spotting an opportunity to get at Mbeki.
The president’s man at Luthuli House and the ANC’s former head of communications, Smuts Ngonyama, altered the list of candidates sent by the party’s parliamentary study group. He left out youth and labour representatives.
Two days after the Polokwane conference Mbeki announced the current SABC board, irking his party, which had passed a resolution asking the state president to ‘ensure that the SABC board is representative of all sectors broadly in our societyâ€. This was political code to warn Mbeki not to confirm his own board but to include those left out by Ngonyama, such as trade unionist Randall Howard, and to exclude some businesspeople.
At issue now are three board members who did not make the original ruling party cut but who were reportedly inserted by Ngonyama and the ANC’s pre-Polokwane deputy secretary general Sankie Mthembi-Mahanyele. The three are Christine Qunta, Andile Mbeki and Gloria Serobe. The ANC Youth League added businessman Peter Vundla to the hit list because he shared a birthday party with deputy chief justice Dikgang Moseneke.
Moseneke’s fault had been to make mildly critical remarks about the ANC president Jacob Zuma. Vundla was the favourite candidate of all parties but he is now in Cosatu’s firing line, together with the other three.
Former presidential spokesperson Bheki Khumalo is also under attack for the conflict of interests created by his current role as spokesperson for the department of minerals and energy.
‘[The SABC board is] a church choir of businesspeople,†said Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi. ‘We endorse calls for the dissolution of the board.â€
It was pointed out to Vavi that Parliament cannot dissolve the board — only Mbeki can do so and he shows no such intention. ‘If not this president, then the next president [will do so],†Vavi said.
Meanwhile, the entire group executive of the SABC has sent a memorandum to the board asking it to rescind its suspension of Mpofu or face a walk-out that could paralyse the broadcaster. The executives reminded the board that Parliament pledged last week that no staff members would face suspension or victimisation following the fisticuffs between board and management.
Fixing Fawlty Towers
The Mail & Guardian‘s Lloyd Gedye spoke to commentators and interested parties about the crisis at the SABC, asking them what they would do to solve it.
Jane Duncan, director of the Freedom of Expression Institute
The crisis at the SABC is the culmination of a growing pattern of unaccountable behaviour over the past two years involving both the corporation and the ANC. It will take time and effort to rebuild accountability. Here are some practical steps:
The investigations of, and the possible disciplinary action against, SABC CEO Dali Mpofu and television news boss Snuki Zikalala should be allowed to run their course, so that due process is followed. While this is happening, plans should be put in place for Mpofu’s replacement, as his contract ends next year.
The board needs to reconsider its approach to the Sisulu commission of inquiry, as it has given contradictory statements about its finding that Zikalala imposed a blacklist of banned commentators on SABC reporters.
The board found no wrongdoing on Zikalala’s part in its statement to the Independent Communication Authority of South Africa, while acknowledging wrongdoing to [Parliament’s portfolio] committee.
A new approach needs to be found to the ongoing political mess around the appointment of the SABC board. Currently questions about the board’s performance are being conflated with unhappiness with the appointment process. The two need to be dealt with separately.
On the performance issue, the board should be put on terms to clean up its act. Only if members fail to do this can a case be made about non-performance.
On the appointments issue, the four members seen as having been imposed on an otherwise fair process by President Thabo Mbeki should be prevailed on to resign. This would defuse the tensions around the board’s legitimacy.
If they do not agree to resign, MPs who were central to the flawed appointment process should support a court application for a review.
It may not be legally possible to recall the board unless a court reviews the flawed process, so a vote of no confidence by Parliament may have no legal effect.
According to the Broadcasting Act, the president, as the appointing body, may remove individual members of the board only on grounds of misconduct or inability to perform their duties efficiently. There is no provision for the removal of the whole board.
In addition, the board has to recommend the removal of its own members, which clearly it will not do in this case.
To ensure that the current mess does not happen again, Parliament must review the Broadcasting Act during its first session next year and invite public participation in the process.
Anton Harber, Caxton journalism professor, Wits University
It seems to me that you have to start with the root problem — the corruption of the process of selecting the board.
[The portfolio committee has] to revisit the board and choose a board with the strength, credibility and authority to do its job. Hopefully it [will be] a board that elects a CEO and head of news that can take the SABC back to being a true public broadcaster.
Parliament may not be the best way to select a board. The best way I have heard of is the way the first SABC board was selected in 1993, by a panel of ‘the good and greatest†chaired by a judge.
We need to remove it from party politics. While the board is tainted, it is a rot that is spreading through the SABC.
Tawana Kupe, professor of literature and language studies at Wits University
The SABC is more in the news now than producing the news; there is something wrong and the loser is the public. I think they need a thorough investigation.
We need to look at the manner in which the board was appointed — it seems that the whole board is compromised. The nomination process was full of controversy.
There is also misunderstanding between the board and the portfolio committee.
Zwelinzima Vavi, Cosatu general secretary
Cosatu wants a board more representative of civil society and the working class. In particular, it wants transport union boss Randall Howard and the former general secretary of the National Council of Trade Unions, Cunningham Ngcukana, appointed to the board.
Howard made the selection to the last board but his name was removed by Luthuli House’s order.
We want to make sure that labour and social issues are taken forward.
We support the dissolution of the current board. We must start afresh without boot-lickers and BEE big fish.
Zizi Kodwa, ANC Youth League spokesperson
The league is in full support of all action taken by Parliament and the portfolio committee on communications [to replace the current board].
The SABC’s independence and impartiality have been compromised. The SABC [has become] a branch of the ANC.
Producers weigh in
The South African Screen Federation (Sasfed) has used Input, an international public television showcase sponsored by the SABC, to express its dissatisfaction about the ongoing crisis at the public broadcaster, writes Kwanele Sosibo.
Sasfed, which represents 17 professional film and other screen media bodies, this week issued a statement condemning the ‘political interference†that it said ‘undermined the original mandate of the SABCâ€.
The disillusionment of local filmmakers with the corporation is widely seen as a key reason for the poor local attendance at Input, an annual conference currently taking place in Sandton.
The SABC is understood to have put about R16-million into the week-long event.
Sasfed’s statement, endorsed by the board of the Sithengi film market and Sergio Borelli, a founding member of Input, said that Sasfed backed the SABC as a public broadcaster. Together with independent filmmakers, it had created some fine examples of public programming, said the statement.
However, it called for an end to ‘the existing crisis, through adherence to a transparent and accountable working relationship between the public broadcaster and the independent filmmaking community — to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the public broadcasterâ€.
Sasfed’s carefully worded statement is understood to stem from years of frustration about the SABC’s operational failures and ineffective management.
The filmmakers believe this has crippled the broadcaster’s relationship with them and their capacity to produce quality programming for local audiences.
‘There’s bad blood between a lot of producers and the SABC, with a lot of people feeling they can’t work with them because they are being censored, disrespected and paid late,†said filmmaker Rehad Desai.
Another filmmaker, speaking on condition of anonymity, said South African filmmakers were fed up with the SABC’s commissioning processes.
‘It’s not like we didn’t know [about Input] but we feel: ‘Why attend if all those high ideals of broadcasting [represented there] are not going to translate into the content we see on our local screens?’â€
Independent producers also complained about the lack of intellectual property ownership in the local industry and the huge contractual backlog at the SABC, which sometimes resulted in programmes being aired before contracts were finalised.
These and other issues are reported to have dented the attendance of local filmmakers at the talk shop, which ends on May 10.
However, Sylvia Vollenhoven, the festival’s organiser, said attendance had exceeded her expectations.
‘Over 540 local delegates have registered and that is a very high figure. We were expecting 1 000 delegates [in total] and we ended up getting more than 1 100, which is double the size of last year’s conference in Lugano, Switzerland.
‘To have 1 000 delegates, that is huge, because it is a small industry globally.â€