MKMVA to lay charges against SABC board

James Etherington-Smith

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“We are going to lay charges against these board members with the relevant authorities… but we are also saying they must resign because they are corrupt,” MKMVA chairman Kebby Maphatsoe said at a media briefing on Tuesday.

“We further call upon the Special Investigations Unit and the Hawks to speedily investigate the SABC Board and the SABC in order that the public boadcaster’s integrity can be restored.”

Maphatsoe charged that board member Cedric Gina compelled SABC management to hire a human resources consulting company that belonged to his personal friend, Justice Ndaba.

He said Gina also insisted that the near-broke broadcaster pays his telephone bills every month despite being a non-permanent board member.

He further charged that chief financial officer Rob Nicholson approved a payment to board member Peter Harris for an amount of R200,000 for work Harris did as a board member.

“To add salt to the wound, he [Harris] was paid through the staff salary system and not as a vendor providing a service in order to hide the money.”

Maphatsoe further accused Harris of insisting to the board that he be in contract negotiations with a French company for the World Cup and subsequently billed the board R200, 000 for his services.

“This is a clear case of embezzlement that is rife in the SABC board.”

Maphatsoe attributed Mokoetle’s suspension to the board wanting to hide corruption. He also accused board members of using the broadcaster as an “employment agency”.

Deputy board chairwoman, Felleng Sekha, who applied for the group chief executive post and was overlooked approached Mokoetle to employ her relative, Ziggy Molosi as a consultant for the SABC, the MKMVA chairman said.

“How do you remove a clean person and replace him with a corrupt person,” Maphatsoe said of Mokoetle being replaced with Nicholson in an acting capacity. 

The SABC accumulated a deficit of R900 million during Nicholson’s tenure as chief financial officer. Maphatsoe described him as having “counter-revolutionary tendencies”. 

“This appointment will reverse the gains of our progressive struggle to transform South Africa.”

Maphatsoe further charged that the move to suspend Mokoetle was political due to the upcoming local government elections.

“The counter revolutionaries want to take over the SABC board and make it political,” he said. 

He described non executive board member David Niddrie, who is also a member of the SA Communist Party as a “yellow communist”

He charged that people were “reconsolidating themselves” so that  they could “own the media” when the local government elections arrived next year.

Maphatsoe said those sitting on the board were not supposed to represent the organisations they belonged to but were expected to represent the public.

The MKMVA will march to parliament next week to hand over a memorandum demanding the resignation of the board. 

It further demanded that Mokoetle be reinstated immediately.

Mokoetle was suspended last week from the position he took up eight months ago and he had indicated that he would challenge his removal and any disciplinary action taken against him. He was reportedly expected to take legal action against his suspension on Tuesday.

Board members challenged Mokoetle on his appointment of Phil Molefe as head of news and his apparent failure to come up with a turnaround strategy for the cash strapped national broadcaster.

The board also questioned chairman Ben Ngubane who backed Mokoetle’s appointing Molefe.

Maphatsoe charged that the board was “fighting Ngubane because he was fighting corruption”.

The Congress of SA Trade Unions who spoke out on the ailing broadcaster last week, felt differently. It said Mokoetle and Ngubane had “persistently undermined the SABC Board and ignored and overturned its decisions”. It was, however, critical of the board, saying it had not yet drafted a turnaround strategy for the SABC — the trade union federation played a key role in the appointment of the board.

“Without a functioning Board… we will see the return of the SABC being used for factional political purposes, as already reflected in the blatantly biased coverage of the public service strike, and the way it reports the issues around the SABC board itself,” Cosatu said following a meeting of its central executive committee.

Mokoetle, who worked for Radio Freedom during apartheid, had a “very good record” with Mkhonto we Sizwe and was a member of the MKMVA in “good standing”. Maphatsoe insisted that the information it possessed on the “corrupt” board members was “true and correct” as the organisation emerged from a “military backgraound” which included “military intelligence”.

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