Chantelle Benjamin
2 November 2009
Johannesburg — A SEPARATE tax is to be imposed on taxpayers to fund the development of broadcasting and the cash-strapped South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), it is proposed in the draft Public Service Broadcasting Bill.
Department of Communications director-general Mamodopi Mohlala said yesterday that a maximum 1% tax would be levied on taxpayers to finance a new Public Service Broadcast Fund.
She said the department was in talks with the South African Revenue Service to determine an "efficient" collection system.
"A tax of up to 1% would be imposed on taxpayers above their personal income tax to assist broadcasting," she said. That would be less costly and cumbersome for the SABC than collecting TV licences.
In the 2007-08 financial year, the SABC got R822m in licence revenue. It is estimated that 1% of personal income tax would bring in more than double that amount, considering personal income tax for 2009-10 is put at R203bn. The SABC has not yet released its 2008-09 financial report.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) expressed doubts yesterday that taxpayers could afford another tax, especially with Eskom price hikes looming.
Mohlala said the SABC spent a lot of time and money collecting licence fees when it should be concentrating on broadcasting. The money would also be used to fund local production for the SABC.
"Licence fee collection poses a huge administrative burden on the SABC, and it involves lawyers and collectors when people do not pay," she said.
Contrary to what the Save Our SABC coalition and DA had said, the bill would not give the minister wide-ranging powers to interfere with content, merely to intervene if the broadcaster was in crisis.
The coalition includes the Freedom of Expression Institute, Media Monitoring Africa, broadcasting sector unions and academics. It met on Friday to discuss the draft bill, which gives the public until December 7 to respond.
Coalition spokeswoman Kate Skinner told The Weekender it would ask for more time to respond as the document had gone straight from discussion document to bill, and was a substantial shift in existing law.
Mohlala said: "The minister's role is a very limited one in the bill. He will only get involved when there is a need to intervene.
"Experience has taught us that there has to be some avenue for the minister to step in if there is a crisis. It's not for him to take over the running of the SABC."
She said performance agreements for the board were included to ensure accountability to government. "There needs to be a clear set of deliverables," she said. "When things disintegrated at the SABC it was hard for government to hold anyone accountable."
Mohlala said motivations by organisations for more time would be considered. "We have given organisations more time to comment in the past, and we know that this bill is a shift from the previous legislation," she said. There would be a lot more discussion before the bill became law.
DA communication spokesman Niekie van den Berg said yesterday that while the bill provided for more government oversight, which he supported, he did not think consumers could take more taxation. "The taxpayer already has to pay for a billion- rand mistake the SABC made."
Van der Berg said an overhaul of Sentech, the state company that carries radio and TV signals for terrestrial broadcasters, was needed before more money was pumped into the SABC.
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