What Is Broken Cannot Be Fixed!

SACP statement about the current state of the SABC

04 June 2009

The SACP is seriously concerned about the deteriorating situation at the SABC, including the worsening debts of the SABC, failure to pay producers, divisions within the board, the breakdown of relations between the board and senior management that has spilt into the public arena, and what is seemingly a breakdown of governance at the institution.

These developments cannot be allowed to continue without seriously damaging the credibility and the capacity of the public broadcaster to perform its role. In fact it is not an exaggeration to say that unless urgent action is taken, the SABC faces total collapse.

The SACP wishes to emphatically reject and strongly condemn the behind the scenes opportunistic maneuvers that have been brought to our attention to try and replace only those board members who have resigned from the SABC Board and do an internal re-shuffle to appoint a new chairperson from amongst the existing board members. As we say, what is broken cannot be fixed! The very composition of the current board, in terms of representivity and competence is completely faulty.

We therefore re-iterate our call for the current SABC board to be immediately dissolved, replaced by an interim board, and for parliament to start a credible process to select a representative, credible and competent board. We shall leave no stone unturned to achieve this objective, including the mobilization of the working class to ensure that we build a better public broadcaster. It is for these reasons that we are throwing our full weight behind today’s protest actions by workers and actors against the SABC.

We call upon the National Assembly’s Portfolio Committee to act without any further delay on this matter.

Since the appointment of the current board, the SACP has, amongst other things, consistently pointed out the following:

• That this board is completely unrepresentative and is dominated by people with business interests with no representatives of the working class and communities served by the SABC

• The circumstances under which the current board was appointed were suspicious and not conducive to the public broadcaster building positive relationships with the key stakeholders, especially the workers and the poor of our country

• The news divisions, at least until recently, has been used as a weapon for one political party thus undermining its role as a provider of news professionally and impartially

• The management of relations between the board and senior management and the management of the finances of the SABC have been scandalous, to say the least

Over the years the SACP has also consistently raised the unrepresentative nature of the many boards of public institutions and state-owned entities, with a particular bias towards appointment of business people, to the total exclusion of representatives of the workers and the poor. The SACP will, in the coming months and years, be actively taking up the question of inclusion of working class, community and NGO representatives in all public and state owned entities. We expect the new administration to do things differently than the previous one when it comes to including the concerns and representatives of the working class and the poor in the functioning of these institutions. This is an important requirement if we are to achieve a truly developmental state.

Issued by the SACP

Contact:
Malesela Maleka
SACP Spokesperson – 082 226 1802