A CONTROVERSIAL deal giving pay-TV operator MultiChoice the pick of the SABC’s archives is to be probed by a parliamentary inquiry into the SABC board.
Also included in the investigation will be the axing of three board members, the failure to implement public protector remedial actions, procurement of a R42 million digital studio, and salary increases and bonuses for Hlaudi Motsoeneng.
Communications Minister Faith Muthambi, former public protector Thuli Madonsela and acting SABC politics editor Sophie Mokoena, along with ex-SABC board members and current staff, are among the 30-plus witnesses on a list approved by the ad hoc committee established to conduct the inquiry.
They are to receive notices of the hearings – set to kick off on November 29 – today.
Committee chairperson Vincent Smith said among the documents to be requested from the SABC were minutes and transcripts of subcommittee and board meetings at which decisions to procure the services of Vision View – relating to the studio – were taken, along with the approval of the MultiChoice deal, the removal of board members Ronnie Lubisi, Rachel Kalidass and the late Hope Zinde, and approval of salaries and bonuses paid to Motsoeneng.
Former SABC chief executive Frans Matlala alleged that after he was suspended, he had been persecuted for co-operating with a Treasury investigation into the Vision View deal.
Lubisi, Kalidass and Zinde are believed to have been axed over their resistance to the appointment of Motsoeneng as permanent chief operating officer and objections to the MultiChoice deal.
The deal controversially obliged the SABC to produce an entertainment channel for broadcast on the DStv platform, comprising its archive material, which critics said was worth far more than the R533m paid for the channel.
The agreement also obliged the SABC not to encrypt any of its channels, dealing a blow to broadcasters such as e.tv, who had been lobbying for encryption to be part of the government’s digital migration policy.