As if Eskom 2.0 isn’t bad enough, the government seems to be hatching another ill-considered plot — to launch some kind of SABC 2.0 as a streaming channel, with a reported R1bn budget.
The government communication & information system (GCIS) has already e-mailed people for “auditions”, according to City Press.
“From what we’ve heard, R1bn has been budgeted for the service,” Media Monitoring Africa director William Bird told City Press. “Who are the viewers, and what existing service will it replace? Wouldn’t it be better to improve the existing communication channels at the various government ministries instead?
“This streaming service is going to compete with the SABC. And if it’s meant to serve as an image-polishing channel for the government, why is public money being used for it?” he added.
Moreover, Bird asks, why is it being kept a secret? “If it’s in the planning stages, why isn’t GCIS telling people about it? If it has nothing to hide, why is it keeping quiet about this?”
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if you could actually get a straight answer out of the government, especially given the word “communication” in GCIS’s title? Its spokesperson WhatsApped that “we can’t comment now”.
As I’ve written before, it is unusual for a columnist to comment on the investigations of other publications, but Bird knows his stuff and has been a consistent and necessary critic of the governing party’s failures to run the SABC properly.
As the name South African Broadcasting Corp implies, the entity is meant to be a public, not a state, broadcaster. There is an important distinction. A public broadcaster does things that are good for the public, providing educational television or access to news people are not able to get anywhere else.
This billion-rand streaming channel is hopefully just electioneering pie in the sky
Such public institutions are also responsible for broadcasting in people’s home languages, of which South Africa has 11. It’s not cheap, and it’s not easy.
But it is profoundly important for the health of a democracy, especially in a country as poor as ours, where a disproportionate number of our people do not have employment. About 32% of us do not get up to go to a job. These people struggle to afford food, airtime, school fees and transport. They are not going to pay for news or entertainment — which leaves them in the hands of the SABC, and, if they can afford the data, with Facebook and YouTube.
The governing party — first the National Party and then the ANC — has not seen beyond the news division and the handy way the SABC can be, literally, “his master’s voice”. This slur is, unfortunately, all too often apt.
Despite there being the occasional freethinker or independent-minded board, the SABC lurches from one crisis to the next, mostly self-created. Its income has cratered. President Cyril Ramaphosa took more than six months to appoint a new board — seemingly because it features former editor-in-chief Phathiswa Magopeni, who famously refused an interview with him.
This billion-rand streaming channel is hopefully just electioneering pie in the sky that will be dismissed like Nathi Mthethwa’s nonsensical R22m flag. We have real problems in this country that need fixing.
*Shapshak is editor-in-chief of Stuff.co.za and executive director of Scrolla.Africa
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