SABC now state broadcaster

WHOEVER had high hopes that South Africa would not go down the road that has been well-trodden by other African states since their independence must be sorely disappointed.

It’s taken a short seven years of the Jacob Zuma presidency to dismantle the nascent independence and professionalism of state institutions that Nelson Mandela and his successor Thabo Mbeki built during their terms of office.

The first institution to go when the current regime took charge was the specialised police unit, the Directorate of Special Operations, also known as the Scorpions.

Even the tax revenue service has not been spared the assault, with its former commissioner and now Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan being threatened with arrest by acolytes who serve at the pleasure of our head of state.

But of all the acolytes and flunkeys who attend the Zuma court, none has been so brazen and so shameless in their eagerness to please the big chief as the de facto chief executive of the SABC, Hlaudi Motsoeneng.

Motsoeneng, whose actual designation is chief operating officer, runs the so-called public broadcaster as his personal fiefdom. In truth, the institution has long ceased to be in the service of the public, and is in reality a state broadcaster in the service of the dominant faction of the governing alliance, at the head of which sits our honourable president.

But even a footman of Motsoeneng’s calibre has outdone himself with his latest move to ban from television, images of protesters destroying public property.

Who is Motsoeneng to decide for millions of South Africans what they can watch on SABC news channels? Who gave him the mandate?

And how ironic that 22 years after the freedom election in 1994, the SABC has reverted to being an instrument of propaganda as it did under the apartheid government. In case some have forgotten, under the National Party, leaders of antiapartheid organisations such as the ANC were effectively banned from SABC channels.

Is this the same ANC which suffered so much under the oppressive regime which now allows its deployee at the SABC to censor the views of members of the public demonstrating their unhappiness at the failure of government to deliver services?

Motsoeneng’s latest edict is not intended to discourage copycats from burning public property. Its main object is to shield the ANC from bad publicity ahead of the competitive local elections in two months.

The ANC is facing a tough election battle, arguably the toughest since the 1994 election. Motsoeneng is merely doing his part to ensure the governing party and his bosses have a competitive advantage in the propaganda stakes.

Welcome to Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe.

What a sad state of affairs for our country.