Cape Town - It has become clear that the African National Congress is not serious about restoring the credibility of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), the Democratic Alliance said on Sunday.
The DA had received a response from Parliament's chair of chairs Cedric Frolick, of the ANC, declining their request for an “unusual meeting” of the communications portfolio committee, DA spokeswoman Phumzile van Damme said.
Last week, the DA requested a meeting in terms of National Assembly rule 223 to have the SABC board, chief operations officer Hlaudi Motsoeneng, and Communications Minister Faith Muthambi appear in Parliament to answer for “the chaos” at the SABC, she said.
The rule allowed for parliamentary committees to meet when Parliament was not in session to discuss urgent matters of national importance.
“We wrote to the ANC chief whip Jackson Mthembu, who passed the matter to Frolick, who declined the request and indicated that a meeting can only take place after the election [August 3 municipal elections].
“This is deeply ironic given that, as reported in the Sunday Times today [Sunday], the ANC has indicated that it is committed to investigating the chaos and censorship at the SABC.
“It is now clear for all to see that the ANC is not serious at all about restoring the credibility of the public broadcaster, and the claim of commitment to investigate is merely a ploy to pull the wool over the publics' eyes and South Africa's media fraternity,” Van Damme said.
The truth was that Motsoeneng was “deployed to the SABC to do the ANC's bidding” during an election where the ANC stood to lose major support.
“Waiting until after the election served the ANC.
The ANC wanted Muthambi and the SABC board to investigate Motsoeneng because they knew it would be another “whitewash”. “Muthambi and [SABC board chairman] Prof [Mbulaheni] Maghuve are staunch supporters of Mr Motsoeneng and have promoted and protected him at every opportunity.
“We give the ANC in Parliament one more chance to fix this matter and convene a meeting of the communications committee or face being in dereliction of its constitutional duties to conduct oversight over the SABC. This simply cannot wait until after the election. The problems at the SABC are now and need to the fixed now,” Van Damme said.
African News Agency