/ 19 January 2017

Why Hlaudi Motsoeneng was not questioned in the SABC inquiry

Every Hlaudi has a silver lining: Say goodbye to nasty 2016 and smile like Mr Sunshine Journalism.
Every Hlaudi has a silver lining: Say goodbye to nasty 2016 and smile like Mr Sunshine Journalism.

Parliament has decided not to call SABC executive Hlaudi Motsoeneng to testify before the ad hoc committee investigating the broadcaster because it says the inquiry is about the SABC and not one man.

The ad hoc committee debated the matter on Thursday morning. ANC MP Vincent Smith, who chairs the committee, said MPs from various parties were nearly unanimous in deciding that only “affected parties” should testify before the committee.

“What is coming from MPs is that anybody affected will be afforded an opportunity to respond,” said Smith. “From where I am sitting this seems to be a fair process.”

On Friday, Nqabayomzi Kwankwa – the chief whip of the United Democratic Movement (UDM) – asked the committee to call Motsoeneng to appear.

Kwankwa has said that Motsoeneng should be called to respond to allegations made against him by witnesses who testified in the inquiry.

On Thursday, he reiterated that Motsoeneng should be called in the interest of “fairness and natural justice”.

But no vote took place to determine if Kwankwa’s request would be granted.

Instead, MPs from the ANC, the DA, the ACDP, the IFP, the NFP and the EFF said that Motsoeneng would be given the opportunity to respond later once the report has been finalised.

A draft version of the report was leaked on social media on Wednesday. 

Motsoeneng appeared to be at the centre of many damning allegations around the ineptitude of the SABC board as result of his various appointments at the public broadcaster since 2009

Despite this, MPs said that the concerns about Motsoeneng had already been addressed in the public protector’s report and in court.

DA MP Phumzile van Damme also criticised Kwankwa for making the request so late.

“The inquiry was never about Hlaudi,” Van Damme told Business Day

“The courts dealt with that. The inquiry was about the fitness of the [SABC] board to hold office … the focus now should be on fixing the SABC … there were a lot of people implicated and we cannot have a situation where every person implicated is called to testify … they will be given an opportunity to defend themselves [in writing] in the draft report.”

The EFF’s Fana Moekana agreed, saying the goal of the inquiry was not to “clear people’s names”, and the ANC’s Makhosi Khoza said that the courts had made a decision on Motsoeneng and MPs should refrain from elevating him to demagogue status.

Members of the ad hoc committee agreed that Motsoeneng would be able to comment on the inquiry once the provisional report had been finalised.

Once the report has been finalised, will have to be adopted by the National Assembly before its findings and recommendations are made binding.