Hajra Omarjee
13 July 2009
Johannesburg — A CALL to extend nominations for the new SABC board would not be considered until the July 31 deadline had lapsed, Parliament's communications portfolio committee chairman, Ismail Vadi, said yesterday.
"We will assess how many nominations we have received when the nomination process closes and then take a decision on whether there is a need to extend the deadline," he said.
Vadi was responding to the Save Our SABC Coalition, which had called for the deadline to be extended on the grounds that Parliament had not done enough to inform the public about the process, and that the nomination period was extremely tight.
The coalition includes the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) and the Freedom of Expression Institute.
"We welcome the campaign to generate interest. But Parliament does not have an unlimited budget. We have advertised in the national newspapers and believe this is sufficient," Vadi said.
Coalition member Prof Tawana Kupe, a media expert, rejected Vadi's response, saying the appointment of a new SABC board was an "important national exercise" and that Parliament was following the "flawed processes" of the past.
"How does he assess what is enough? You could have 100 nominations from Cosatu or business. Would that be enough? This is a board that must be representative of the people of SA."
Kupe said he read five newspapers a day and had struggled to find the advertisement.
The coalition said the notices, placed in the Sunday Times, Star, Mail & Guardian and Rapport , were "wholly insufficient" as most South Africans did not read newspapers and those who did would need to search to find the adverts.
"They are small, black-and-white adverts tucked away in the supplementary sections of these newspapers," said Cosatu's Patrick Craven.
The African National Congress's alliance partners -- Cosatu and the South African Communist Party -- have expressed unhappiness over the SABC's interim board, believing it is not representative of working-class interests.
Also, opposition political parties believe that the ANC promised an inclusive process but railroaded its preferred names through Parliament.
Vadi said the interim board would be out of office soon and that the portfolio committee was committed to a transparent process .
"What is important are the permanent board members. That is were our focus is. I do not see a problem with the short list being on the parliamentary website and the interviews will be opened to the public," he said.
Craven said Cosatu would lobby for an extension of the deadline.
"We will write to the portfolio committee. We want communities across the country to have access to this process," Craven said.
The public spat over the nomination of board members is the latest in the SABC saga. Apart from tension within the alliance over the nomination process, the SABC is also facing a wage strike and a financial crisis.
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