How would public run SABC?
IT IS a shame that in pursing his campaign for an independent public broadcaster, Raymond Louw in, Impartial body needed to select SABC board (Weekender, November 15-16), opportunistically misrepresents an exchange during a Weekender debate at Wits on whether the SABC is a state broadcaster.
In order to make topical his preference for the appointment of the SABC board by a group of “eminent persons”, he accuses me of “promptly dismissing” the notion that the public broadcaster should be controlled by the public. I did not dismiss such a notion then and do not now.
The question is not whether the public broadcaster should be controlled by the public — but how. Practically, how would the public exert control? I asked how such a principle is implemented.
What is in place is a system of appointment that a democratically elected government instituted for ensuring public control of the public broadcaster. The rationale of this system is that MPs represent the people, and as such, recommend the board to the president, who also represents the majority of the citizenry as the leader of the dominant party. Not such a strange idea in a democracy.
That this may not be sufficient, or that the system omits critical safeguards required to ensure the independence of the SABC, or that the system has been wilfully abused through political interference, as claimed, are matters that follow on from that.
The failure to acknowledge the current outcomes in the SABC denies the democratic process that produced it: flawed, abused or not. More significantly, it exonerates those who have exercised their democratic responsibilities in the appointment of the board, under duress or not, from owning the outcomes.
If the system is tainted, as the Save Our SABC Coalition claims, then evidence should have been brought and the appointment of this board legally challenged. Those responsible for the appointment or the manipulation of the process need to account to the public and accept responsibility for the subsequent actions of their appointees, particularly their appointed leaders.
Calls for board members “of integrity” to dismiss the outcome of a democratic process through which they had been appointed, in favour of a legally untested allegation that the very body that appointed them was party to political machinations, appear highly disrespectful of legitimate (but not necessarily unflawed) public process.
Likewise, appeals for self-respecting board members to disassociate themselves publicly from certain board decisions reflect a failure to understand notions of collective responsibility that underpin collective decision-making and sound corporate governance. No corporation operating in a competitive commercial environment as the SABC does could withstand the ongoing public dissension and the exploitation of it by competing interest groups.
Does that mean that individuals do not independently apply their minds to issues and vote on all decisions as the henchmen of the former president and homogenous agent of empowerment capital, Thabo Mbeki, as caricatured at the Wits debate by Blade Nzimande of the South African Communist Party? No, it does not.
Are those who dissent with the majority on decisions, bound by the decision of the majority? Yes, they are. May they publicly distance themselves from board decisions because they disagree with the majority? No, even if it might be personally easier to do so. That they are able to record their dissension if they object to the decision is a given, and the SABC board minutes evidence numerous examples of such dissenting votes.
Nor would removing the contradiction in the funding model — much needed as it is — address this problem. Even if the public broadcaster was fully publicly funded (and there are problems associated with that) it would not remove the need for the public broadcaster to compete for audience share. What government could justify funding a marginalised public broadcaster with diminishing audiences?
It’s not possible to deny that we are experiencing the outcomes of party politicisation of necessarily independent institutions appointed in a similar fashion over the past decade. This is true of the appointment of the SABC board and by dint of that the appointment of the senior management.
The challenge for the African National Congress is to take responsibility for that in ways that address the fundamental problems within the system, rather than seeking to replace appointees perceived to represent one faction not preferred by them, with another that is.
The challenge for those wishing to realise their alternatives to this system, is to deal with these vital issues not from a position of righteous indignation or by evoking “the people” to push through narrow ideological preferences, but through engagement that acknowledges the legitimacy of democratic outcomes.
Dealing with these issues as though only certain groups have a monopoly on what is good and proper with regard to matters of freedom of expression, democracy and media freedom blunts debate and opportunities for transformation.
That a special case for the protection of public broadcasting that may constrain the democratic prerogative of a freely elected government needs to be made, is indisputable. Removal of the board of the public broadcaster by simple party majority vote in Parliament without due process as proposed by the current amendment to the Broadcasting Act before Parliament, supported by the Save Our SABC alliance, is a contradiction of all national policy commitments to broadcasting independence.
Defenders of the public broadcaster should not be blinded by the opportunity provided by this amendment to the law to remove this board of the antidemocratic potential it unleashes.
Its use to deal with the politically induced crisis within the public broadcaster will create a dangerous precedent for party political and party factional interference in future.
Lest this be seen as an appeal to retain this board, on which I sit, let me state clearly it is not about the removal of individuals on this particular board, or that a board of the public broadcaster should never be removed — it is how it is done in ways that safeguard its independence while ensuring its accountability.
We have a national asset that is haemorrhaging. The challenge of ensuring the SABC is able to add public value in a globally competitive environment; demonstrate the expertise and experience that made possible the appointment of SA as a host nation to the World Cup; lead migration to digital broadcasting, without which it will fail; and guarantee the free and fair coverage of the democratic process in action in the lead-up to elections, is further undermined each day that the future of the public broadcaster is left uncertain.
For this reason, if nothing else, can we rebuild a national consensus around this significant democratic institution and invaluable national asset that rises above party-political and sectional interests, safeguards its independence, enables its relevance, and ensures its accountability?
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