Funding of the arts in South Africa is in a thoroughly rotten state. Allegations of outright corruption are seldom made or legally pursued. One may however safely make the observation that much funding in the arts is venal, dodgy, unethical, questionable, given to the unqualified and undeserving, riddled with nepotism, awash with shady practices, and that all of this carries on mostly unremarked upon.
Arts and culture is one of the most easily accessible government coffers for patronage and wholesale looting. Were the arts to be given the full credit they deserve for contributing to our well-being as a society, and were our cultural institutions appreciated for the way they enrich our lives, there would and ought to be riots in the streets by now.
Funding of the arts has been in a steadily worsening crisis. It is urgent that something be done, and it is high time the minister took the agencies to task. Now a number of organisational and legislative moves are afoot set to rock the arts and culture sector in the year ahead.
Comments made to the City Press by Mashatile promise a shake-up of the institutions that are life-and-death for artists. But is the minister, who does not have an unblemished record after the debacle around the funding for the Venice Biennale last year, simply blowing hot air and reshuffling the same rotten pack? That is what the arts community is waiting to see.
A new white paper for arts and culture is scheduled for presentation to Cabinet this month. The last white paper was in 1996 and it is high time for a review. The policies then set out have fallen way short of achieving their noble objectives, and have had numerous unintended adverse consequences.
Opacity and unhelpfulness
Mashatile has criticised the National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund (NLDTF) referring to it as “my biggest nightmare”. Many in the arts community, even including recipients of Lotto’s largesse, wholeheartedly agree with him. The organisation is notorious for its opacity, unhelpfulness, lack of accountability, and unreliability. For instance, funding for this year’s National Arts Festival only came through at the eleventh hour, causing considerable distress; major institutions such as the Baxter Theatre have been ignored; and smaller, more vulnerable companies have been brought to the point of collapse.
This, when over the past decade the department of arts and culture has become something of a conservative heritage project, leaving funding for the active arts increasingly to the lottery. The National Arts Council, which is meant to be peer-directed and to fund craft, theatre, dance, music, literature and the visual arts nationally, has a piffling grant budget in the order of R50-million to R60-million. By comparison, for the year ending March 2013, the lottery paid out R511-million to the arts and national heritage organisations.
Proposals to create one centralised funding agency for the arts, including film, are doing the rounds at the highest level. Some see it as the minister making a bold power grab. This also comes at a time when the draft Lotteries Amendment Bill seeks to redefine Lotto’s distribution agencies and possibly bring them under direct state control.
Though many would like to see the back of the NLDTF, there are worries that a single funding body concentrates all the power and money in a few political hands. Others think one chief will be better than dealing with 10 smaller fiefdoms.
Although often frustrated by the NAC, and in spite of it being rocked by various scandals over the years, the arts community is generally more sympathetic to the NAC that other funding bodies.
Critics note that the department of arts and culture has itself hardly been a model of efficiency when it comes to funding. How would it suddenly reform itself while accruing bigger coffers?
In his 2013/14 budget vote speech on May 16, Mashatile told the National Assembly the music industry faced numerous challenges including social security for artists and “problems with the collection and distribution of royalties”. By which he meant: Samro – the South African Music Rights Organisation – isn’t performing.
He affirmed that the National Film and Video Foundation was to be restructured and a film fund established. Following last year’s formation of a visual arts task team, he announced the formation of two further task teams, one to look at the music industry, the other a content task team working with department of communications, Icasa, SABC, CNBC Africa, MultiChoice and “the entire television sector”. This comes as South Africa prepares to introduce digital television.
Setting the agenda of broadcasting
It has at long last dawned upon government that there should be close working relationship between the SABC and the department of arts and culture.
The task team to investigate increasing local content on TV will be chaired by the highly experienced former arts and culture director general Themba Wakashe, with Professor Jyoti Maistry as deputy chair. Although unconfirmed other names mentioned include Simphiwe Dana, Mandla Langa, Eddie Mbalo, Eric Miyeni, Linda Sibiya and Chicco Twala. The minister of communications is still to make her nominations.
Wakashe says the task team will convene within the week and a press conference will be held soon to inform the public of its terms of reference. Essentially, however, what is at stake is no less than “setting the agenda of broadcasting in South Africa for the next 20 years”.
With the digital migration there will be a proliferation of channels, and Wakashe says: “We don’t want them to be loaded with [only] international content. We want South Africans to benefit. It is important our screens must be distinguishable [to one] from being anywhere else in the world.” He adds it should “not just be entertainment".
“It is important the arts sector has proposals on the table when digitising happens to provide content, and have a strategically positioned plan that is implementable.”
The crucial question, says Wakashe, is how that content is to be financed?
This is where the lottery comes in. “Among the many different funding bodies, what degree of complementarity do we have? How do we harness that? We need a consensus strategy.”
The process, he says, will be opened up for public participation.
Among high hopes, scepticism, alarm and cautious optimism, the arts community had best respond.