CAPE TOWN - The Portfolio Committee on Communications said on Thursday that they are in the process of filling the four vacant positions on the board of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), and hope to do so by the end of this year.
This was after the Chairperson of the Board, Bongumusa Makhathini, made an appeal for a full support from the committee, saying that a full complement of the board is crucial to effectively oversee corporate governance at the public broadcaster.
The SABC appeared before the committee together with the Media Diversity and Development Agency (MDDA) to report on the annual reports and financial statements for the 2017/18 financial year.
It then reported a disclaimer audit opinion, but the MDDA, on the other side, reported an unqualified audit opinion.
A NEW TURN
Communications Minister Nomvula Mokonyane said the SABC remained committed to implementing its turnaround strategy in order to turn the corner and stabilise.
“In the presentation, there would be an attempt to indicate some of the things that have been put together but in the work that has been identified, one is the commitment to reposition the SABC.
“Secondly, to put a multi-pronged turnaround strategy that does not only look at the SABC of its past glory, but also the SABC of the future that would also be adapting to opportunities of the fourth industrial revolution to the issues around content and contributing towards nation building and social cohesion, the issues around leadership,” said Mokonyane.
She said that while the public broadcaster did not have permanent senior managers, such as the Group chief executive and a chief financial officer, among others, during the year under review, the current team resembled a top management structure that is stabilising and ready to execute its mandate.
SABC Board chairperson Bongumusa Makhathini said the public broadcaster’s turnaround strategy mainly addresses three key areas – legacy governance issues; addressing regulatory and policy issues – dealing with issues like sports rights.
“The team is hard at work [to implement] … that,” he said.