Chain reaction caused by failure of South Africa’s oldest state-owned company

The failed South African Post Office (Sapo) has played a role in extending the analogue switch-off date to next year.

This is according to Media Monitoring Africa director William Bird, who told the SABC that the Post Office’s business rescue plan constrained the rollout of set-top boxes to people in rural areas.

“You’ve had the poorest of the poor expected to go to Post Offices to collect their set-top boxes and register, and at the same time, you’ve had over three hundred branches close around the country,” Bird said.

“Where are those Post Offices most likely to be? They are the ones that are in rural areas where your most marginalised people need to get them.”

Bird says that, as a result, those with the fewest resources need to use the most to obtain a set-top box.

To accommodate South African households that only have the technology to intercept analogue TV signals, the government is rolling out set-top boxes allowing impoverished households to access digital terrestrial television.

Prior to the extension, the deadline for the analogue switch-off had been 31 December 2024. However, communications Minister Solly Malatsi said roughly 467,000 households still need set-top boxes.

Last week, he received buy-in from his fellow cabinet ministers to postpone the switch-off until 31 March 2025.

As Bird mentioned, the Post Office has been responsible for enabling indigent South Africans to collect and register for set-top boxes, but the state postal service’s business rescue plan has greatly hindered these efforts.

Sapo was placed into business rescue in July 2023, and business rescue practitioners Anoosh Rooplal and Juanito Damons were appointed to formulate a plan, which was adopted in December of that year.

The plan has so far resulted in 4,875 people being retrenched out of the 11,083 staff that were employed at the ailing entity.

Of its 1,023 branches, it was decided that 366 should be closed as only 113 were profitable. This left 657 branches nationwide.

Similar to how Sapo has become a bottomless money pit, receiving R10.4 billion in bailouts over the past decade, so has the Department of Communications and Digital Technology’s analogue switch-off campaign.

Malatsi has said there is no denying that the Broadcasting Digital Migration project has dragged on for far too long.

Over the past decade, it has cost the government R1.23 billion just for dual illumination — transmitting analogue and digital signals simultaneously.

When asked about his stance on yet another extension, Bird said that it is something the government needs to be held accountable for.

“Not only should the current administration be held accountable, but also preceding entities and ministers who failed to properly roll out set-top boxes,” says Bird.

“This is about an ongoing inability to make sure the poor and indigent have access to television.”

The table below summarises all the deadlines for the digital migration programme, whether they were delivered or missed, and which ministers had served in the relevant periods.