Thursday, September 19, 2013

The blind leading the blind - literally - with the new SABC board, as massive fraud is perpetrated against the South African viewer.


The beleaguered, struggling and ongoing public embarrassement which is the SABC will not get better.

Massive public fraud is being perpetrated against every single South African TV viewer who are forced to pay a TV licence in this country and who are being let down by vindictive, clueless, arrogant, selfish, party loyal politician trash who blatantly choose wrong SABC board members just as long as their political party is happy and it serves their interests.

Elected government officials deliberately chose NOT the best candidates with broadcasting experience and public broadcasting expertise to serve on the new SABC board but party loyal incompetent cadres who knows of broadcasting nothing or little, and will most likely continue to wreck the sinking bedlam broadcaster further.

The sheer audacity of trash politicians, tasked with oversight of the SABC but clearly clueless or blatantly unwilling to learn from the past and to educate themselves and to serve the public and the viewing public in South Africa, tactless and in a tacky way, voted their trash friends onto the board of a crumbling institution.

Meanwhile the SABC is in desperate need for help - not haplessness.

Parliament's National Assembly will today get the names of the new SABC board - the SABC's 5th board in 5 years. The National Assembly always rubber stamps it, then it goes to president Jacob Zuma who also just rubber stamps the political appointments.

The SABC board will now have its very first blind person. The SABC board will again not have a single Afrikaans speaking person looking after the interests of this broad cross section of the South African population (just as in previous SABC boards) despite it being the third largest grouping in South Africa.

The SABC board will again not have people who have served many years as broadcasters or in a real broadcasting environment and with broadcasting expertise.

The SABC is on life support. Organs are failing. Transplants and resusitation is critically needed.

Yet instead of a group of highly skilled, highly informed specialist doctors, the South African government, South Africa's parliament and South Africa's president Jacob Zuma sees no problem to send the sick patient on the verge of death only more orderlies - and orderlies who previously balked, bailed, resigned and ran away as previous SABC board members because they didn't want to do it anymore, but who now gain sit on the cushy comfy seats in the SABC's Auckland Park boardroom.

Sadly there are specialist doctors - people like the Kate Skinners and William Gumedes - who show up at the door and who are willing to help fix the SABC - but who are turned away by parliament's ANC led portfolio committee on communications who make the wrong choices and vote for the wrong people as far as public broadcasting interests in South Africa are concerned.

The disastrous decisions and votes by South Africa's parliament to bulldoze through a new SABC board now makes the South African government directly complicit in the ongoing, massive failure of the SABC.

Parliament's portfolio committee on communications - tasked with oversight of the once proud broadcasting institution and to help it - is directly abetting its ongoing struggle by deliberately choosing not to place the best possible candidates in charge as members of the SABC board.

It's highly likely, given the history, that this latest extremely foolish, incredibly sad and publicly fraudulent decision which is not in the best interest of the South African viewing public, will once again come back to haunt everyone compelled to pay a SABC TV licence.